Chandravir Dev

“What a woman tells her lover in desire
should be written out on air & running water.”
― Catullus, I Hate and I Love

“I think we ought to read only the kind of books that wound or stab us. If the book we're reading doesn't wake us up with a blow to the head, what are we reading for? So that it will make us happy, as you write? Good Lord, we would be happy precisely if we had no books, and the kind of books that make us happy are the kind we could write ourselves if we had to. But we need books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us. That is my belief.”
― Franz Kafka

“सुनो, जिसे हम पीड़ा कहते हैं, उसका जीने या मरने से कोई सम्बन्ध नहीं। उसका धागा प्रेम से जुड़ा होता है, वह खिंचता है, तो दर्द की लहर उठती है, ‘अगर तुम मुझे चाहते हो’, उसने कहा था। मुझे लगता है, उसका विश्वास ईश्वर में नहीं, मुझमें था”
― Nirmal Verma, अन्तिम अरण्य

“Your worst sin is that you have destroyed and betrayed yourself for nothing.”
― Fyodor Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment