237 books
—
177 voters
Jayan Parameswaran
https://www.goodreads.com/kpjayan
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“We're often silent. We don't yell and we don't complain. We're patient, as always. Because we don't have the words yet. We're afraid to talk about it. We don't know how. It's not an ordinary experience, and the questions it raises are not ordinary. The world has been split in two: there's us, the Chernobylites, and then there's you, the others. Have you noticed? No one here points out that they're Russian or Belarussian or Ukrainian. We all call ourselves Chernobylites. "We're from Chernobyl." "I'm a Chernobylite." As if this is a separate people. A new nation.”
― Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
― Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
“It was around this time that I’d begun trying to perfect the art of fucking with people’s minds. I’d figured out that when someone else was hogging the limelight, you could cut him down to size by bringing up a subject he didn’t know anything about. If the other person knew a lot about literature, I’d talk about the Velvet Underground; if he knew a lot about rock, I’d talk about Messiaen; if he knew a lot about classical music, I’d talk about Roy Lichtenstein; if he knew a lot about pop art, I’d talk about Jean Genet; and so on. Do that in a small provincial city and you never lose an argument.”
― 69
― 69
“I told you. There’s nothing heroic here, nothing for the writer’s pen. I had thoughts like, It’s not wartime, why should I have to risk myself while someone else is sleeping with my wife? Why me again, and not him? To be honest, I didn’t see any heroes there. I saw nutcases, who didn’t care about their own lives, and I had enough craziness myself, but it wasn’t necessary. I also have medals and awards—but that’s because I wasn’t afraid of dying. I didn’t care! It was even something of an out. They’d have buried me with honors. And the government would have paid for it.”
― Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
― Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster
“In the end, writing arises when man realizes that memory is not enough.”
― Time Shelter
― Time Shelter
“If you want to win, you need to know just one thing and not to waste your time on anything else: the pleasures of erudition are reserved for losers. The more a person knows, the more things have gone wrong.”
― Numero Zero: An Acclaimed Political Thriller Unraveling Mussolini's Conspiracy, Media Hoaxes, and Italian History
― Numero Zero: An Acclaimed Political Thriller Unraveling Mussolini's Conspiracy, Media Hoaxes, and Italian History
Jayan’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Jayan’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
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