Gorab > Gorab's Quotes

“When you have lived as long as I have, the div replied, you find that cruelty and benevolence are but shades of the same color.”
― Khaled Hosseini, And the Mountains Echoed

“A story is like a moving train: no matter where you hop onboard, you are bound to reach your destination sooner or later.”
― Khaled Hosseini, And the Mountains Echoed

“Fate always gives you two choices, Scorpio George once said: the one you should take, and the one you do.”
― Gregory David Roberts, Shantaram

“Once on a yellow piece of paper with green lines
he wrote a poem
And he called it "Chops"
because that was the name of his dog

And that's what it was all about
And his teacher gave him an A
and a gold star
And his mother hung it on the kitchen door
and read it to his aunts
That was the year Father Tracy
took all the kids to the zoo

And he let them sing on the bus
And his little sister was born
with tiny toenails and no hair
And his mother and father kissed a lot
And the girl around the corner sent him a
Valentine signed with a row of X's

and he had to ask his father what the X's meant
And his father always tucked him in bed at night
And was always there to do it

Once on a piece of white paper with blue lines
he wrote a poem
And he called it "Autumn"

because that was the name of the season
And that's what it was all about
And his teacher gave him an A
and asked him to write more clearly
And his mother never hung it on the kitchen door
because of its new paint

And the kids told him
that Father Tracy smoked cigars
And left butts on the pews
And sometimes they would burn holes
That was the year his sister got glasses
with thick lenses and black frames
And the girl around the corner laughed

when he asked her to go see Santa Claus
And the kids told him why
his mother and father kissed a lot
And his father never tucked him in bed at night
And his father got mad
when he cried for him to do it.


Once on a paper torn from his notebook
he wrote a poem
And he called it "Innocence: A Question"
because that was the question about his girl
And that's what it was all about
And his professor gave him an A

and a strange steady look
And his mother never hung it on the kitchen door
because he never showed her
That was the year that Father Tracy died
And he forgot how the end
of the Apostle's Creed went

And he caught his sister
making out on the back porch
And his mother and father never kissed
or even talked
And the girl around the corner
wore too much makeup
That made him cough when he kissed her

but he kissed her anyway
because that was the thing to do
And at three a.m. he tucked himself into bed
his father snoring soundly

That's why on the back of a brown paper bag
he tried another poem

And he called it "Absolutely Nothing"
Because that's what it was really all about
And he gave himself an A
and a slash on each damned wrist
And he hung it on the bathroom door
because this time he didn't think

he could reach the kitchen.”
― Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower

“Friendship was another illusion like love, though it did not reach the same mad heights. People pretended that they were friends, when the fact was they were brought together by force of circumstances.”
― R.K. Narayan, The Bachelor of Arts

“After riding like a moron all over the place, observe the face of an Indian when he crashes. He is stunned.”
― Manu Joseph, Serious Men

“He was wearing a blue tracksuit that had a white tick mark embroidered at the hip, as if he approved of something.”
― Manu Joseph, Serious Men

“The tragedy of mediocrity is that even mediocre people shake their heads and mull over how “standards are falling”. So”
― Manu Joseph, Serious Men

“The doer must do only when the receiver is ready to receive. Otherwise, the act is wasted.”
― Khushwant Singh, Train to Pakistan

“India is constipated with a lot of humbug. Take religion. For the Hindu, it means little besides caste and cow-protection. For the Muslim, circumcision and kosher meat. For the Sikh, long hair and hatred of the Muslim. For the Christian, Hinduism with a sola topee. For the Parsi, fire-worship and feeding vultures. Ethics, which should be the kernel of a religious code, has been carefully removed.”
― Khushwant Singh, Train to Pakistan

“We are of the mysterious East. No proof, just faith. No reason, just faith.”
― Khushwant Singh, Train to Pakistan

“The lawyer with the briefcase can steal more money than the man with the gun.”
― Mario Puzo, The Godfather

“Geography is not just about the physical terrain, but also about the meaning that we attribute to it. Thus, the Saraswati flows, invisibly, at Allahabad.”
― Sanjeev Sanyal, Land of seven rivers: History of India's Geography

“We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos

“the more truthful you are, the less people are inclined to believe you.”
― Shatrujeet Nath, Vikramaditya Veergatha Book 1 The Guardians of the Halahala

“It seems we would rather have a past filled with great scientists than just great artists and writers who could dream up these wonderful and awe-inspiring creations. It's a strange irony: we're spending our time trying to find the truth in our past, but creating myths of ourselves in the present.”
― Aditya Iyengar, The Thirteenth Day

“Non-fiction can distort; facts can be realigned. But fiction never lies.”
― V.S. Naipaul, A Bend in the River

“I didn't go to bookshops to buy. That's a little bourgeois. I went because they were civilized places. It made me happy there were people who sat down and wrote and wrote and wrote and there were other people who devoted their lives to making those words into books. It was lovely. Like standing in the middle of civilization.”
― Jerry Pinto, Em and The Big Hoom

“Honestly.I don't understand Zen.It seems if you don't answer properly,or if you are rude,people get enlightened.”
― Jerry Pinto, Em and The Big Hoom

“In this world, it is very hard to escape happiness.” – Unni Chacko”
― Manu Joseph, The Illicit Happiness of Other People

“Men do things. We can't help it. That's all there is to it. As you will discover in time, the primary choice every man has to make is whether he wants to be himself or if he wants peace.”
― Manu Joseph, The Illicit Happiness of Other People

“Ambition is the capacity for unhappiness.”
― Manu Joseph, The Illicit Happiness of Other People

“The number of secrets I receive is in inverse proportion to the number of secrets anyone expects me to have of my own. And this is the real source of my dismay. Being told secrets is not - never has been - a sign that I belong or that I matter. It is quite the opposite: confirmation of my irrelevance.”
― Zoë Heller, What Was She Thinking? [Notes on a Scandal]

“किसी से मिलकर नाइस मीटिंग यू अगर कभी लगा भी करे तो बोला मत करो। कुछ चीज़ें बोलते ही कचरा हो जाती हैं।”
― Divya Prakash Dubey, मुसाफिर Cafe

“समंदर जितना बेचैन होता है हम उसके पास पहुँचकर उतना ही शांत हो जाते हैं। यही ज़िन्दगी का हाल है - पूरा बेचैन हुए बिना जैसे शांति मिल ही नहीं सकती।”
― Divya Prakash Dubey, मुसाफिर Cafe

“जिनको कभी-कभी गुस्सा आता है उनको जब गुस्सा आता है तो वो कंट्रोल नहीं कर पाते। इसलिए थोड़ा-थोड़ा गुस्सा करते रहना चाहिए, रिश्तों और जिंदगी चलाते रहने के लिए अच्छा रहता है।”
― Divya Prakash Dubey, मुसाफिर Cafe

“लाइफ को लेकर प्लान बड़े नहीं, सिम्पल होने चाहिए। प्लान बहुत बड़े हो जाएँ तो लाइफ के लिए ही जगह नहीं बचती।”
― Divya Prakash Dubey, मुसाफिर Cafe

“गलतियाँ सुधारनी जरुर चाहिए लेकिन मिटानी नहीं चाहिए। गलतियाँ वो पगडंडियाँ होती है जो बताती रहती हैं कि हमने शुरू कहाँ से किया था।”
― Divya Prakash Dubey, मुसाफिर Cafe

“If you want life-long friendship and selfless camaraderie, join the army and learn to kill.
If you want a lifetime of temporary alliances with peers who will glory in your every failure, write novels.”
― J.K. Rowling, The Silkworm

“It is supposed to be in very bad taste to discuss a person behind his back; and to discuss a dead person behind his back is most unfair, for he cannot even retaliate.”
― Ruskin Bond, Best Of Ruskin Bond