Quotes from Gregory David Roberts

who was always the first to read the words, and to speak love for them; and my mother and my stepfather, whose unflagging moral, spiritual, and financial support—beyond what I've ever deserved or could repay—has sustained me, and uplifted this work.

Sometimes you have to surrender before you win.

the lion must roar, just to remind the horse of his fear.

And when you left, I didn't feel anything at all. Not a thing. I didn't want to be forgiven because of what I did. I wanted to be forgiven—and I still

I was sure he'd calculated the risks, and decided it was safe. And every day of my life was a risk.

want it, and that's why I'm going to Khaled and Idriss—because I don't feel sorry for any of it, and I don't regret a thing. I'm cold inside, Lin. I like people, and I like things, but I don't love any of them—not even myself—and I don't really care about them. And, you know, the strange thing is, I don't really wish that I did care.

He was permanently exhausted and beset by all the torments, terrible and trivial, that poverty endures.

The worst things that people do to us always make us feel ashamed. The worst things that people do always strike at the part of us that wants to love the world. And a tiny part of the shame we feel, when we're violated, is shame at being human.

Virtue is concerned with what we do, and honour is concerned with how we do it. You can fight a war in an honourable way—the Geneva Convention exists for that very reason—and you can enforce the peace without any honour at all. In its essence, honour is the art of being humble.

is necessary to do the wrong thing for the right reasons. The important thing is to be sure that our reasons are right, and that we admit the wrong—that we do not lie to ourselves, and convince ourselves that what we do is right.

Some loves are like that. Most loves are like that, from what I can see. Your heart starts to feel like an overcrowded lifeboat. You throw your pride out to keep it afloat, and your self-respect and your independence. After a while you start throwing people out - your friends, everyone you used to know. And it's still not enough. The lifeboat is still sinking, and you know it's going to take you down with it.

All political systems favour the powerful rich over the defenceless poor.

He'd been trying to tell me that every human will has the power to transform its fate. I'd always

He was one of those guys who smile as a tactic, you know, and not because they actually feel anything worth smiling about. Kind of like the way a chimpanzee smiles.

I surrendered to India, as I did every day, then, and as I still do, every day of my life, no matter where I am in the world.

was something unchangeable: fixed for every one of us at birth, and as constant as the circuit of the stars. But I suddenly realised that life is stranger and more beautiful than that. The truth is that, no matter what kind of game you find yourself in, no matter how good or bad the luck, you can change your life completely with a single thought or a single act of love.

Some men only really begin to like you when they find themselves in your debt.

I sighed, sure in my own mind that the new war would change nothing: that wars can't really change things. It's peace that makes the deepest cuts, I thought.

It isn't a secret, unless keeping it hurts.

I`d developed a style in dealing with foreigners that won their trust quickly. That style was two parts showman, two parts flatterer, and one part philanderer, combined with a hint of mischief, a sniff of condescension, and a pinch of contempt.

I let my eyes drift into the maze of leaves that only trees understand. Hatred has its gravitational web, locking stray specks of confusion into spirals of violence.

How old is he?' 'Thirty.' 'He looks older.' 'They all do. All the Europeans look older and angrier than they really are. It's a white thing.

They claim a hidden corner of our hearts, all those moments that stay with us unscreamed.

The rich in any country, and any system, always got the best justice money could buy.