Quotes from Gulzar

I am not an artist. I am not a painter.

We have been teaching 'Paradise Lost' and 'Julius Caesar' to the students but we are not teaching them 'Kalidas' or Indian drama and epics.

All my earlier awards were for a particular film or a song. Even the Oscar or the Grammy was for a particular song, but Dadasaheb Phalke is for my entire work so it is the biggest honor for me.

When my family migrated from Punjab during the Partition, we came to Delhi and I was enrolled in United Mission School.

Partition happened in my life but do you think I should be living in partition? I have seen it but as India has moved further and as a generation has moved further I am also moving further.

There is an old guest house opposite my house, and grandsons visit from time to time from the U.S., every time grown up a little. I don't know whether the same grandchildren come every time or it is someone else.

A vendor selling coconuts on the road is a philosopher. He will have ideas on politics, economics, history, sports. This has saved India. The fact that the common Indian is a thinker is vital.

When I write a poem, I do not have to worry about using a higher Urdu vocabulary because I know the reader knows Urdu well.

My daughter is married here in Patiala and I have shared a bond with Punjabi as a language.

There are no borders in poetry and language.

A film carries six fine arts - it consists of architecture, painting, music, writing or literature, photography and performance. It's a conjecture of all these things and yet based on literature.

Short stories and poems are an intense burst of emotions.

I want young children to savor and enjoy Tagore like I did since I was a child. He was too great a poet of India to be kept limited to Bengal. Everybody should read and celebrate him.

Being in the Sahitya Akademi, I did know quite a few poets - Jayanta Mahapatra, Sitakant Mahapatra, Sunil Gangopadhyay, to name a few. There were many poets.

NASA is my favorite website. The universe with its abstract nature attracts me. The abstract element in my poetry comes from there.

Cinema has a large scope as it is a mirror of society and with the mindset changing, people are taking it more seriously.

Do you know Afghan children wear shoes when they sleep, so they can run easily if a bomb falls during the night? Iraq has been similarly pushed against the wall. What proof did the West ultimately have, what justification for raining bombs on them?

If a film promotes communal harmony, which for me is beyond religion, I am happy to work on it because the film's premise is in line with my beliefs.

My father used to run a shop in Sadar Bazar in old Delhi, and most of my time would go spending days and evenings at the shop, whiling away hours doing nothing.

I firmly believe that Tagore should be taught in schools all over India.

My first love is literature.

In film lyrics, I avoid Persianised words because they are not widely understood.

Power manipulates the innocent and terror is born.

Because of my pseudonym Gulzar, which is how I am known, some people think I am a Muslim.