ऋत्विक

“India, she now knew, would not be content staying in the background, was nobody's wallpaper, insisted in interjecting itself into everyone's life, meddling with it, twisting it, molding it beyond recognition. India, she had found out, was a place of political intrigue and economic corruption, a place occupied by real people with their incessantly human needs, desires, ambitions, and aspirations, and not the exotic, spiritual, mysterious entity that was a creation of the Western imagination.”
― Thrity Umrigar, The Weight of Heaven

“How can the mind take hold of such a country? Generations of invaders have tried, but they remain in exile. The important towns they build are only retreats, their quarrels the malaise of men who cannot find their way home. India knows of their trouble. She knows of the whole world's trouble, to its uttermost depth. She calls "Come" through her hundred mouths, through objects ridiculous and august. But come to what? She has never defined. She is not a promise, only an appeal.”
― E.M. Forster, A Passage to India: A Reader's Guide to Essential Criticism

“What makes the desert beautiful,' said the little prince, 'is that somewhere it hides a well...”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince

“The fact that the price must be paid is proof it is worth paying.”
― Robert Jordan, The Eye of the World