Vinay Kumaran

“He believes his own fantasy and fights for it with a diseased fury. He’s a pygmy with only one talent, the ability to convince others he’s a giant.”
― Isaac Asimov, The Gods Themselves

“He was immediately seconded by several other Frenchmen. The interpreter was frightened and did not dare translate what they said. So the twenty Americans on the podium looked on once more with smiles full of good will, many nodding agreement. One of them even lifted his fist in the air because he knew Europeans liked to raise their fists in times of collective euphoria.”
― Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

“Her feeling was rather that, given the nature of the human couple, the love of man and woman is a priori inferior to that which can exist (at least in the best instances) in the love between man and dog, that oddity of human history probably unplanned by the Creator. It is a completely selfless love: Tereza did not want anything of Karenin; she did not ever ask him to love her back. Nor had she ever asked herself the questions that plague human couples: Does he love me? Does he love anyone more than me? Does he love me more than I love him? Perhaps all the questions we ask of love, to measure, test, probe, and save it, have the additional effect of cutting it short.”
― Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

“Humans, too, are becoming numerous. We don’t cull egrets because they are beautiful and ornamental. We don’t cull humans because they are economically useful. However, if left completely unchecked, they would both ruin their environment. They eat; they breed; they shit. Neither is good at keeping their world clean and tidy. Too stupid, essentially.”
― Peter F. Hamilton, Exodus: The Archimedes Engine