Quietly they moved down the calm and sacred river that had come down to earth so that its waters might flow over the ashes of those long dead, and that would continue to flow long after the human race had, through hatred and knowledge, burned itself out.
VIKRAM SETHRevision has its own peculiar pleasures and its own peculiar frustrations. The ground rules are already established; the characters already exist. You don’t have to bring the characters to life, but you do have to make them more convincing.
More Vikram Seth Quotes
-
-
There are plenty of good Indian writers in English, and none of us feel we are carrying the burden of being a poster boy.
VIKRAM SETH -
It is exciting to write about the present once one gets beyond the trivia of the moment. As a time to live in, as a time to think about, the present is intriguing.
VIKRAM SETH -
Don’t put things off till it’s too late. You are the DJ of your fate.
VIKRAM SETH -
I think goodness is about how person behaves to person, and also person to world, to nature.
VIKRAM SETH -
Put your backbone where your wishbone is.
VIKRAM SETH -
I don’t pick and choose subjects or settings; they pick and choose me.
VIKRAM SETH -
You will get what you want but you must want it and not just wish it.
VIKRAM SETH -
Think of many things. Never place your happiness in one person’s power. Be just to yourself.
VIKRAM SETH -
I rarely listen to music while writing. If I don’t like it, it bothers me, and if I like it, it absorbs me so much I can’t write.
VIKRAM SETH -
I want my books to sell, to be read. I’m not interested in being obscure.
VIKRAM SETH -
The thing about inspiration is that it takes your mind off everything else.
VIKRAM SETH -
My eyes close. I am here and not here. A waking nap? A flight to the end of the galaxy and perhaps a couple of billion light-years beyond?
VIKRAM SETH -
Boredom provides a stronger inclination to write than anything.
VIKRAM SETH -
Fiction basically is a form of gossip where you want to enter other people’s lives, the lives of people you don’t know, and you want to know what’s going to happen to them.
VIKRAM SETH -
You get your inspiration – suggestions – wherever you have to, even from your mother.
VIKRAM SETH -
In a painting, you can’t make out whether the artist painted the left eye before the right eye. In Chinese calligraphy, you can see the progression of the artist’s stroke.
VIKRAM SETH -
You have to learn a few things, which you do along the way, but basically, poetry is a matter of the ear. Iambic pentameters or what constitutes a stanza comes naturally – your ears will know.
VIKRAM SETH -
To not be able to love the one you love is to have your life wrenched away.
VIKRAM SETH -
In life’s brief game to be a winner A man must have; oh yes, above All else, of course, someone to love.
VIKRAM SETH -
I don’t think anyone should be banned. If you don’t like a book, set it aside.
VIKRAM SETH -
I am certainly not allergic to causes – particularly on subjects such as religious intolerance.
VIKRAM SETH -
Poetry, I think, intensifies the reader’s experience. If it’s a humorous facet of the story, poetry makes it more exuberant. If it’s a sad facet, poetry can make it more poignant.
VIKRAM SETH -
I often feel newspapers are just filling up space. Of course, I also know people who write really long books.
VIKRAM SETH -
Man without life companion is either god or beast.
VIKRAM SETH -
You know, I can imagine not writing a novel and writing poetry only.
VIKRAM SETH -
Is it not love that knows how to make smooth things rough and rough things smooth?
VIKRAM SETH