Quotes from Orhan Pamuk

We fall in love more deeply when were unhappy.

Being a fiction writer makes you someone who works with irresponsibility.

Let us say in the pocket of one of my old coats I find a movie ticket from many years ago. Once I see the ticket, not only do I remember that I saw this movie, but also scenes from this movie, which I think I have entirely forgotten, come back to me. Objects have this power, and I like it.

From a very young age, I suspected there was more to my world than I could see: somewhere in the streets of Istanbul, in a house resembling ours, there lived another Orhan so much like me he could pass for my twin, even my double.

I wanted to tell a romantic and dark side of Ottoman history that was also slightly political, saying to the previous generation of writers, 'Look, I'm interested in Ottoman things, and I'm not afraid of it, and I'm doing something creative.'

Oscar Wilde always makes me smile - with respect and admiration. His short stories prove that it is possible to be both sarcastic, even cynical, but deeply compassionate. Just seeing the cover of one of Wilde's books in a bookshop makes me smile.

I believe in a world where there are no heroes, and I've read and know humanity a lot. There are moments that I admire in a person courage, intellect, hard work. These are the qualities I admire in an intellectual, in a writer, and there are so many people who have these things.

What is the thing you want most from me? What can I do to make you love me?' Be yourself,' said Ipek.

Immersing oneself in the problems of a book is a good way to keep from thinking of love.

I don't judge my characters.

My hero wants to belong too, but he doesn't want to give up all the things he came to value in the west.

Nothing can be as astounding as life. Except for writing. Yes, of course, except for writing, the sole consolation.

I came across humanity in Istanbul, and all I know about life comes from Istanbul, and definitely, I am writing about Istanbul. I also love the city because I live there, it has formed me, and it's me. Of course it is natural. If somebody lived all his life in Delhi, he will write about Delhi.

I have always thought that the place where you sleep or the place you share with your partner should be separate from the place where you write. The domestic rituals and details somehow kill the imagination. They kill the demon in me.

There's been quite a clear upswing in nationalist sentiments. Everyone is talking about it, in Turkey as well.

Generally, I get bad reviews in Turkey.

I have been attacked in Turkey more for my interviews than for my books. Political polemicists and columnists do not read novels there.

The fueling of anti-Turkish sentiment in Europe is resulting in an anti-European, indiscriminate nationalism in Turkey.

People look at me as sort of a diplomat for Turkey, which by nature, I'm not; I don't want to be. It's again about that playfulness. Being Turkey's voice or representative is not playful, it's not childlike; it makes me self-conscious, kills the child in me.

These political movements flourish on the margins of Turkish society because of poverty and because of the people's feeling that they are not being represented.

More than anything I am a novelist. But for me, an author's job is not only to create linguistically accomplished works. As an author I also want to stimulate discussion.

I am proud to be a Turk, and to write in Turkish about Turkey - and to have been translated into about 40 languages. But I don't want to politicize things by dramatizing them.

I don't like to make strong statements. I want to write strong novels … I keep my deep radical things for my novels.

I do know this much though: If a man resorts to wiles, guile and petty deceptions, it means he's nowhere near being in love.