Vikram Chandra · 542 pages
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“Ask him why there are hypocrites in the world.'
'Because it is hard to bear the happiness of others.'
'When are we happy?'
'When we desire nothing and realize that possession is only momentary, and so are forever playing.'
'What is regret?'
'To realize that one has spent one's life worrying about the future.'
'What is sorrow?'
'To long for the past.'
'What is the highest pleasure?'
'To hear a good story.”
― Vikram Chandra, quote from Red Earth and Pouring Rain
“And so I began to read,' Sorkar said. 'And at first the complete works were like a jungle, the language was quicksand. Metaphors turned beneath my feet and became biting snakes, similes fled from my grasp like frightened deer, taking all meaning with them. All was alien, and amidst the hanging, entangling creepers of this foreign grammar, all sound became a cacophany. I feared for myself, for my health and sanity, but then I thought of my purpose, of where I was and who I was, of pain and I pressed on.”
― Vikram Chandra, quote from Red Earth and Pouring Rain
“Then what in your opinion is a good story?'
'What it's always been, monkey,' Ganesha said. 'One dhansu conflict. Some chaka-chak song and dance. Grief. Love. Love for the lover, love for the mother. Love for the land. Comedy. Terror. One tremendous villain whom we must love also. All the elements properly balanced and mixed together, item after item, like a perfect meal with a dance of tastes. There you have it.”
― Vikram Chandra, quote from Red Earth and Pouring Rain
“What could my mother be
to yours? What kin is my father
to yours anyway? And how
did you and I meet ever?
But in love
our hearts have mingled
like red earth and pouring rain.”
― Vikram Chandra, quote from Red Earth and Pouring Rain
“The future is simple. The future is simple, I can hold it i the palm of my hand; and the present is just a matter of endurance, detachment, and a sense of humor.”
― Vikram Chandra, quote from Red Earth and Pouring Rain
“--'There is no completeness; nothing endures, nothing lives; there is only change, unreasoning unreasonable; only birth and death repeating the same story each time, yet different; why?' The voice laughed--'Why you know already; look in your hands.”
― Vikram Chandra, quote from Red Earth and Pouring Rain
Vikram Chandra
Born place: in New Delhi, India
Born date January 1, 1961
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“I am like a leaf on a river, riding along the top of the water, not quite floating, not quite drowning. So I can't stop, and I can't control the direction I am going. I can feel the water, but I never know which way I am heading.
But I might feel lucky this day and avoid the sticks and branches scratching and pulling at me. ”
― Nora Raleigh Baskin, quote from Anything But Typical
“So we see that what looks like a dead, uninteresting thing—a glass of water with a cover, that has been sitting there for perhaps twenty years—really contains a dynamic and interesting phenomenon which is going on all the time. To”
― Richard Feynman, quote from Six Easy Pieces: Essentials of Physics By Its Most Brilliant Teacher
“You believe me wise because I taught you once, but I have not been north, as you have. You have seen (what) I have never seen...You flatter me by asking my opinion.”
― Gene Wolfe, quote from The Citadel of the Autarch
“If the worst is going to happen, it'll happen. Worrying can't protect you from that. And if it doesn't happen then you've missed out on all the time that when you could have been having fun”
― Alexandra Potter, quote from Who's That Girl?
“Blasted grave marker. There sure are a bloody lot of them. They've got some nerve burying all these dead people here.”
― Tess Oliver, quote from Camille
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