Desai Quotes & Sayings

I love Truman Capote, Tennessee Williams, Flannery O'Connor. I read a lot of American writers. — Kiran Desai

Life at any time can become difficult: life at any time can become easy. It all depends upon how one adjusts oneself to life. — Morarji Desai

I do not want to go into its physical reasons: the construction of the human body is different from that of carnivorous animals. But man's intelligence is such that it can be utilised to defend any-thing he does, whether right or wrong. — Morarji Desai

India had a very long independence movement. It started in 1886, [with] the first generation of Western-educated Indians. They were all liberals. They followed the Liberal Party in Britain, and they were very proud of their knowledge of parliamentary systems, parliamentary manners. They were big debaters. They [had], as it were, a long apprenticeship in training for being in power. Even when Gandhi made it a mass movement, the idea of elective representatives, elected working committees, elected leadership, all that stayed because basically Indians wanted to impress the British that they were going to be as good as the British were at running a parliamentary democracy. And that helped quite a lot. — Meghnad Desai

Not only the footwear, wear also the courtesy, respect, and gratitude in your heart while stepping out of home. — Rupali Desai

You must live every moment of your life in such a way that if you had to live it over and over again till infinity, this would be a good thing. — Tanuja Desai Hidier

The moon that hung over the garden like some great priceless pearl, flawed and blemished with grey shadowy ridges as only a very great beauty can risk being. — Anita Desai

He was the real hero, Tenzing," Gyan had said, "Hilary couldn't have made it without sherpas carrying his bags." Everyone around had agreed. Tenzing was certainly first, or else he was made to wait with the bags so Hilary could take the first step on behalf of that colonial enterprise of sticking your flag on what was not yours.
Sai had wondered, should humans conquer the mountain or should they wish for the mountain to possess them? Sherpas went up and down, ten times, fifteen times in some cases, without glory, without claim of ownership, and there were those who said it was sacred and shouldn't be sullied at all. — Kiran Desai

And it now occurred to me that maybe the whole point was, in fact, to lose yourself. But not in the sense of confusion
in the sense of connection to something bigger than yourself ... Getting lost to be found. — Tanuja Desai Hidier

Life's experiences, regardless of how they show up, are the means through which we get to love one another — Panache Desai

The vegetarian movement is an ancient movement and is not quite a modern one. — Morarji Desai

The publishing world is very timid. Readers are much braver. — Kiran Desai

But while the residents were shocked by the violence, they were also often surprised by the mundaneness of it all. Discovered the extent of perversity the heart is capable of as they sat at home with nothing to do, and found that it was possible, faced with the stench of unimaginable evil, for a human being to grow bored, yawn, be absorbed by the problem of a missing sock, by neighborly irritations, to feel hunger skipping like a little mouse inside a tummy and return, once again, to the pressing matter of what to eat ... There they were, the most commonplace of them, those quite mismatched with the larger-than-life questions, caught up in the mythic battles of past vs. present, justice vs. injustice
the most ordinary swept up in extraordinary hatred, because extraordinary hatred was, after all, a commonplace event, — Kiran Desai

A talent or a thing that is a bit more than ordinary in someone should be appreciable - regardless of personal liking, opinion, or boundaries of judgment. — Rupali Desai

Slowly, painstakingly, like ants, men would make their paths and civilization and their wars once again, only to have it wash away again. — Kiran Desai

Sadness was so claustrophobic. — Kiran Desai

No one, not all the armies of the world, can stop an idea whose time has come. — Rudrajeet Desai

India is a curious place that still preserves the past, religions, and its history. No matter how modern India becomes, it is still very much an old country. — Anita Desai

If we do not want to be pained by anybody we must not pain anybody; and how can man consider himself humane if he wants to live at the cost of others. — Morarji Desai

But the child shouldn't be blamed for the father's crime, she tried to reason with herself, then. But should the child therefore also enjoy the father's illicit gain? — Kiran Desai

Usually a feeling of disappointment follows the book, because what I hoped to write is not what I actually accomplished. However, it becomes a motivation to write the next book. — Anita Desai

We think of immigration as a Western issue but, of course, it isn't. — Kiran Desai

The wheel turns and turns and turns: it never stops and stands still. — Anita Desai

He knew what his father thought: that immigration, so often presented as a heroic act, could just as easily be the opposite; that it was cowardice that led many to America; fear marked the journey, not bravery; a cockroachy desire to scuttle to where you never saw poverty, not really, never had to suffer a tug to your conscience; where you never heard the demands of servants, beggars, bankrupt relatives, and where your generosity would never be openly claimed; where by merely looking after your wife-child-dog-yard you could feel virtuous. Experience the relief of being an unknown transplant to the locals and hide the perspective granted by journey. Ohio was the first place he loved, for there at last he had been able to acquire poise
— Kiran Desai

Many characters in the novel are representative of types that exist in India. He represents the caste system in India with an air of superiority, the caste system in India and the people thinking that western things are better. — Anita Desai

All of the third-world flights docked here, families waiting days for their connections, squatting on the floor in big bacterial clumps, and it was a long trek to where the European-North American travelers came and went, making those brisk, no-nonsense flights with extra leg-room and private TV, whizzing over for a single meeting in such a manner that it was truly hard to imagine they were shitting-peeing, bleeding-weeping humans at all. Silk and cashmere, bleached teeth, Prozac, laptops, and a sandwich for their lunch named the Milano. — Kiran Desai

But so fluid a thing was love.It wasn't firm,he was learning, it wasn't a scripture;it was a wobbliness that lent itself to betrayal,taking the mold of whatever he poured he poured it into.And in fact,it was difficult to keep from pouring it into numerous vessels.It could be used for all kinds of purposes ... He wished it were a constraint.It was truly beginning to frighten him. — Kiran Desai

Writing, for me, means humility. It's a process that involves fear and doubt, especially if you're writing honestly. — Kiran Desai

Now here was Saeed Saeed, and Biju's admiration for the man confounded him. Fate worked this way. Biju was overcome by the desire to be his friend, because Saeed Saeed wasn't drowning, he was bobbing in the tides. — Kiran Desai

You being you is the blessing. You being you is the miracle. You being you is enough. You being you is your soul signature. — Panache Desai

I feel as comfortable anywhere as I feel uncomfortable anywhere. — Kiran Desai

Self-help must precede help from others. Even for making certain of help from heaven, one has to help oneself. — Morarji Desai

Ever since I could first write I have been doing so. When I was taught how to write and read at school, I made up my mind that this was what I love to do best and this was the world I was going to occupy. — Anita Desai

When he died, I went about like a ragged crow telling strangers, "My father died, my father died." My indiscretion embarrassed me, but I could not help it. Without my father on his Delhi rooftop, why was I here? Without him there, why should I go back? Without that ache between us, what was I made of? — Kiran Desai

Someone who wants to write should make an effort to write a little something every day. Writing in this sense is the same as athletes who practice a sport every day to keep their skills honed. — Anita Desai

Manmohan Desai's cinema wasn't about logic. It was about exuberance, vitality and above all, entertainment. — Anupama Chopra

The book begins and ends with the visits to give the impression of a tunnel into their ancestors and family history. I believe in going backwards into the past - I felt I was digging a tunnel back to the past. — Anita Desai

It is, therefore, a fact that anybody who wants to realise Truth or who wants to be humane, must follow non-violent ways of life, otherwise he will not be able to reach the Truth. — Morarji Desai

Saeed quickly found employment at a Banana Republic, where he would sell to urban sophisticates the black turtleneck of the season, in a shop whose name was synonymous with colonial exploitation and the rapacious ruin of the third world. — Kiran Desai

One can't be kind to one person and cruel to another. — Morarji Desai

Never again would he know love for a human being that wasn't adulterated by another, contradictory emotion. — Kiran Desai

As an index of social change, perhaps we should follow the popularity of the slap as some sort of measure of our belief in social hierarchy. The slap carries with it all the accumulated power of the past; it uses an entire social class as its accompanying army. As we relate to each other as individuals not necessarily embedded in our respective hierarchies, perhaps we will punch each other more frequently. In some truly ironic way, that might be good news. — Santosh Desai

It was a terrible thing to be awake while some people flew, carrying the world over his head, and others slept, claiming it from under his feet. — Kiran Desai

A journey once begun, has no end — Kiran Desai

Society at present suffers far more from waste of money than from want of it. There is dignity in every attempt to economise. It indicates self-denial and imparts strength of character. It produces a well-regulated mind. — Morarji Desai

I do think that the modern India does belong to writers who are living in India. — Kiran Desai

From this it follows that con-sideration for other persons or for other living beings is very vital for goodness and want of consideration for other people makes human beings selfish, regardless for other people's good. — Morarji Desai

When I was very young, I used to share much of what I wrote with my family, but as I got older and more self-conscious, it became a much more private process. — Anita Desai

Say goodbye to this energy of fear that kept you safe but small. — Panache Desai

Do you know anyone who would - secretly, sincerely, in his innermost self - really prefer to return to childhood? — Anita Desai

All day, the colors had been those of dusk, mist moving like a water creature across the great flanks of mountains possessed of ocean shadows and depths. — Kiran Desai

No fruit dies so vile and offensive a death as the banana ... — Kiran Desai

What was a country but the idea of it? — Kiran Desai

Only their efforts to make him talk failed. he would say one word at a time, if pressed, but seemed happier not to and could not be made to repeat a whole line. Gradually, as his family learnt how to anticipate his few needs and how to respond, they ceased to notice his silence -his manner of communication seemed full and rich enough to them: he no more needed to converse than Aunt Mira's cat did. — Anita Desai

Greenness hangs, drips and sways from every branch and twig and frond in the surging luxuriance of July. — Anita Desai

She'd have to propel herself into the future by whatever means possible or she'd be trapped forever in a place whose times had already passed. — Kiran Desai

Nonviolence presupposes a level of humanness--however low it may be, in every human being. — Narayan Desai

Could fulfillment be felt as deeply as loss. — Kiran Desai

Of one thing, though, she was sure: "I want to travel," she confessed.
Books were making her restless. She was beginning to read, faster, more, until she was inside the narrative and the narrative inside her, the pages going by so fast, her heart in her chest - she couldn't stop... And pictures of the chocolaty Amazon, of stark Patagonia in the National Geographics, a transparent butterfly snail in the sea, even of an old Japanese house slumbering in the snow... - She found they affected her so much she could often hardly read the accompanying words - the feeling they created was so exquisite, the desire so painful. — Kiran Desai

When I was growing up the publishing world seemed so far away. When my mother wrote a book, she would look up the address of publishers on the backs of the books she owned and send off her manuscript. — Kiran Desai

If there is one thing I would want you to take away from this book, it's the knowledge that you have the power to change your belief system. With the right beliefs, nothing is impossible to achieve. Therefore, if there is one thing you wish to change in yourself, start working on your beliefs. IN — Kulin Desai

A man wasn't equal to an animal, not one particle of him. Human life was stinking corrupt, and meanwhile there were beautiful creatures who lived with delicacy on the earth without doing anyone harm. "We should be dying." the judge almost wept. — Kiran Desai

For those who believe in God the matter is simpler still and clearly than anything else: because those who believe in God believe that God is the Creator of the whole Universe and there is nothing that does not come from Him. — Morarji Desai

Wherever you go becomes a part of you somehow. — Anita Desai

Be everything with so much love in your heart that you would never want to do it any other way. — Amrit Desai

Year by year, his life wasn't amounting to anything at all...And yet, another part of him had expanded: his self-consciousness, his self-pity -- oh, the tediousness of it...Shouldn't he return to a life where he might slice his own importance, to where he might relinquish this overrated control over his own destiny and perhaps be subtracted from its determination altogether? He might even experience that greatest luxury of not noticing himself at all. — Kiran Desai

it was just fate in the way fate has of providing the destitute with a greater quota of accidents for which nobody can be blamed. — Kiran Desai

If you write a lovely story about India, you're criticized for selling an exotic version of India. And if you write critically about India, you're seen as portraying it in a negative light - it also seems to be a popular way to present India, sort of mangoes and beggars. — Kiran Desai

What a sense of possession, of confidence, it gave one to have pockets, to shove one's fists into them, as if in simply owning pockets one owned riches, owned independence. — Anita Desai

His lines had been honed over centuries, passed down through generations, for poor people needed certain lines; the script was always the same, and they had no option but to beg for mercy. — Kiran Desai

Don't be scared, puppy dog, little frog, little duck, duckie dog. It's just rain. — Kiran Desai

She was right. After all, if she herself had wondered whether she was Indian enough
she, who had always been to me a sort of epitome of Indian
then who could be? Who could claim the sole right or way to an identity? — Tanuja Desai Hidier

I don't think you can write according to a set of rules and laws; every writer is so different. — Kiran Desai

But then, how could you have any self-respect knowing that you didn't believe in anything exactly? How did you embrace what was yours if you didn't leave something for it? How did you create a life of meaning and pride? — Kiran Desai

This was how history moved, the slow build, the quick burn, and in an incoherence, the leaping both backward and forward, swallowing the young into old hate. — Kiran Desai

Therefore, vegetarianism alone can give us the quality of com-passion, which distinguishes man from the rest of the animal world. — Morarji Desai

In India, if you are from the elite, dogs are extremely important. The breed of the dog indicates your wealth, that you are westernized. The cook, another human being, is on a much lower level than your dog. You see this all the time. — Kiran Desai

An expert gives an objective view. He gives his own view. — Morarji Desai

Looking a dead insect in the sack of basmati that had come all the way from Dehra Dun, he almost wept with sorrow and marvel at its journey, which was tenderness for his own journey. In India almost nobody would be able to afford this rice, and you had to travel around the world to be able to eat such things where they were cheap enough that you could gobble them down without being rich; and when you got home to the place where they grew, you couldn't afford them anymore. — Kiran Desai

Although it was shadowy and dark, Bim could see as well as by the clear light of day that she felt only love and yearning for them all, and if there were hurts, these gashes in her side that bled, then it was only because her love was imperfect and did not encompass them thoroughly enough, and because it had flaws and inadequacies and did not extend to all equally. — Anita Desai

He wasn't a bad person. He didn't want to fight. The trouble was that he'd tried to be part of the larger questions, tried to become part of politics and history. Happiness had a smaller location, though this wasn't something to flaunt, of course; very few would stand up and announce, 'Actually, I'm a coward,' but his timidity might be disguised, well, in a perfectly ordinary existence situated between meek contours ... Cowardice needed its facade, its reasoning, like anything else if it was to be his life's principle. Contentment is no easy matter. One had to situate it cannily, camoflauge it, pretend it was something else. — Kiran Desai

This way of leaving your family for work had condemned them over several generations to have their hearts always in other places, their minds thinking about people elsewhere; they could never be in a single existence at one time. How wonderful it was going to be to have things otherwise. — Kiran Desai

The Himalayas rose layer upon layer until those gleaming peaks proved a man to be so small that it made sense to give it all up, empty it all out. — Kiran Desai

You can catch more flies with honey than with sour milk — Kiran Desai

With your lunch box, do not forget to carry courtesy, respect, and gratitude from home! — Rupali Desai

People think that because I write about India I must be trying to portray India in a way. — Anita Desai

How could anything be the same? The red of blood lay over the market road in slick pools mingled with a yellow spread of dal someone must have brought in anticipation of a picnic after the parade, and there were flies on it, left behind odd slippers, and a sad pair of broken spectacles, even a tooth. It was rather like the government warning about safety that appeared in the cinema before the movie with the image of a man cycling to work, a poor man but with a wife who loved him, and she had sent his lunch with him in a tiffin container; then came a blowing of horns and small, desperate cycle tinkle, and a messy blur clearing into the silent still image of a spread of food mingled with blood. Those mismatched colors, domesticity shuffled with death, sureness running into the unexpected, kindness replaced by the image of violence, always made the cook feel like throwing up and weeping both together. — Kiran Desai

In the early ages, I believe not much thought was given to what man is and what his real functions should be, and what is the real purpose of his life. — Morarji Desai

Should humans conquer the mountain or should they wish for the mountain to possess them? — Kiran Desai

The oak tree is firm and elegant and upright. The weeping willow has allowed the burdens of life to bend it. — Panache Desai

Quick, nervy and jumpy -yet to the children she was as constant as a staff, a tree that can be counted on not to pull up its root and shift in the night. She was the tree that grew in the centre of their lives and in whose shade they lived. — Anita Desai

The fact was that one was left empty-handed. There was no system to soothe the unfairness of things; justice was without scope; it might snag the stealer of chickens, but great evasive crimes would have to be dismissed because, if identified and netted, they would bring down the entire structure of so-called civilization. For crimes that took place in the monstrous dealings between nations, for crimes that took place in those intimate spaces between two people without a witness ... — Kiran Desai

When the news of the creature broke, it was possible that the victims had attributed to the Monkeyman injuries that they had unknowingly inflicted on themselves in their sleep.

'It could be mass hysteria caused by mass media,' he concluded.

Dr. Desai's report lay on my desk for many days: a snap-shot of a city splintering under the strain of a fundamental urban reconfiguration- a city of the exhausted, distressed, and restless, struggling with the uncertainties of eviction and unemployment; a city of twenty million histrionic personas resiliently absorbing the day's glancing blows only to return home and tenderly claw themselves to sleep. — Aman Sethi

When I am writing, I focus one hundred percent on my writing. Then, by the time I'm half way through the book, I'm already thinking about the ending. — Anita Desai

We need to find our courage, which, of course, is not the absence of fear but rather the willingness to feel the fear and move forward anyway. Fear isn't going to kill us. It's an energy that we can allow to move through us. — Panache Desai

Fame must be received with gratitude and handled with humility. — Rupali Desai

As long as man eats animals how can cruelty to animals be removed. — Morarji Desai

They say in the east you love the person you marry and in the west you marry the person you love. But maybe it's a lot simpler than that. Maybe you just love the person you love. — Tanuja Desai Hidier

I do not say that one who is vegetarian is full of compassion and one who is not, is otherwise. We sometimes find people, who are vegetarians, are very bad people. — Morarji Desai

We should propagate the values of vegetarianism. — Morarji Desai