Quotes from Vikram Seth

In the painting I saw, in the books I read, I recalled her, for she her had in many ways been the making of me.

Life is not easy for anyone here. Loss and fear, failure and disappointment, pain and ill-health, doubt and death-even those who have escaped from poverty have no escape from these. What makes life bearable is love-to love, to be loved, and-even after death or parting-to know that you have loved and been loved.

Sometimes i write the best about the things that I care about least

The past is the past, and he can't make amends, only hope that the gain will outlast the damage.

Strange to be a man and never grow big with child. To feel a part of you opening, and a part of you leaving, and howling as if it were not a part of you.

May we not be as foolish as we are almost bound to be. If we cannot eschew hatred, at least let us eschew group hatred. May we see that we could have been born as each other. May we, in short, believe in humane logic and perhaps, in due course, love.

How rarely these few years, as work keeps up aloof, Or fares, or one thing or another, How we had days to spend under our parents' roof; Myself, my sister, and my brother. All five of us will die; to reckon from the past This flesh and blood is unforgiving. What's hard is that just one of us will be the last To bear it all and go on living.

Perhaps it is true that for all the evidence of the mirror, one pictures oneself in some deep niche of the mind as forever 18.

I have learned to follow another voice, to be alone and to understand things - maybe to be alone and to be misunderstood.

And sometimes both of them forgot that what they were undergoing amid the clink of cutlery and crockery was a mutual interview that might decide whether or not they would own a common set of those items some time in the whimsical future.

The thing about inspiration is that it takes your mind off everything else.

It was a warm evening, and there was less silk and more fine cotton than at Savita's wedding. But the jewellery glittered just as gloriously. Meenakshi's little pear-earrings, Veena's navratan and Malati's emeralds glinted across the garden, whispering to each other the stories of their owners.

Let the smoky Käll sustain himself on Mars, and Yuko lay rue on Beethoven's grave. Let the lord of the manor of Rochdale clap his coffin into a canoe and disport himself on the waters. Let Zsa-Zsa sleep on a pillow of haddock in Maria's cello case. Let Mrs Wessen live to see her thousandth moon. Let Ysobel unknit her forehead. Let not poor Virginie weep. Let all and no things come to pass, for how will I pass these days?

ghazal that he had heard Saeeda Bai sing, but, oddly

it's our turn, you know—to join the student welfare committee of the university. . . .' Oh no, thought Pran, there goes one day every week. '. . . and I have decided to volunteer you.' I didn't know the verb was transitive, thought Pran.

each point in the universe must make up its own mind on the question of acknowledgement before acknowledgement can be considered universal.

But what should I do?' Varun was saying. 'I'm not good for anything.' 'Write a book! Pull a rickshaw! Live! Don't make excuses,' said Dr. Ila Chattopadhyay, shaking her grey hair vigorously. 'Renounce the world like Dipankar. No, he's joined a bank, hasn't he? How did you do in your exams anyway?' she added." - Vikram Seth, "A Suitable Boy

A volte penso che in tempi di profonda angoscia sia una consolazione sapere che il mondo, tutto sommato, se ne infischia.

La scortesia della gente ferisce solo se continuiamo a ricordarla.

Odio quelli che vanno in giro con l'aria da martire, proprio come detesto l'autocommiserazione. È causa di troppa infelicità.

All over India, all over the world, as the sun or the shadow of darkness moves from east to west, the call to prayer moves with it, and people kneel down in a wave to pray to God. Five waves each day - one for each namaaz - ripple across the globe from longitude to longtigude. The component elements change direction, like iron filings near a magnet - towards the house of God in Mecca.

I vecchi si aggrappano al potere e alle loro convinzioni, che ammettono tutti i loro vizi peggiori ma escludono il minimo errore e soffocano la minima innovazione dei giovani. Poi, grazie a Dio, muoiono e non possono fare più danni. Ma ormai noi, i giovani, siamo diventati vecchi, e ci sforziamo di quel po' di male che loro hanno lasciato incompiuto.

Think of many things. Never place your happiness in one person's power. Just be to yourself.

My tea has overbrewed: it is bitter, but still drinkable. I turn on the television and return to the present. Four plump humanoid creatures, red, yellow, green and purple, are frolicking on a grassy hill. Rabbits nibble the grass. The creatures hug each other. A periscope emerges from a knoll and tells them they must say goodbye. After a little protest, they do, jumping one by one into a hole in the ground.