Those books of mine that are remunerative – I’m not talking about poetry here – take years to write, and I am never sure they’ll be successful. So writing is a risk in more senses than one.
VIKRAM SETHThink of many things. Never place your happiness in one person’s power. Be just to yourself.
More Vikram Seth Quotes
-
-
I spent many years of my life as an economist and demographer. I was finally distracted by writing my novels and poetry. I’m enormously happy that was the case. I feel that with writing I have found my metier.
VIKRAM SETH -
I want my books to sell, to be read. I’m not interested in being obscure.
VIKRAM SETH -
Think of many things. Never place your happiness in one person’s power. Be just to yourself.
VIKRAM SETH -
I need my natural laziness to be counteracted by obsession in order to do anything.
VIKRAM SETH -
I tend to follow a scattershot approach to reading a lot of very diverse subjects interest me, and I’m quite happy to read stuff on any of them.
VIKRAM SETH -
God save us from people who mean well.
VIKRAM SETH -
I simply seem to drift. But I sort of allow the drift, because it has a kind of check – it forces me to work harder at what I’m interested in.
VIKRAM SETH -
Good books get praised, bad books get praised. Good books get ignored, bad books get ignored.
VIKRAM SETH -
I often feel newspapers are just filling up space. Of course, I also know people who write really long books.
VIKRAM SETH -
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 -
You can talk good ideas out of existence.
VIKRAM SETH -
I don’t think people give Indian society enough credit. We may not like to talk much about things but we do, basically, want to live and let live.
VIKRAM SETH -
Every object strives for its proper place. A book seeks to be near its truest admirer. Just as this helpless moth seeks to be near the candle that infatuates him.
VIKRAM SETH -
In spite of all temptations of belonging to many nations, I’ve remained an Indian.
VIKRAM SETH -
You know, I can imagine not writing a novel and writing poetry only.
VIKRAM SETH -
To not be able to love the one you love is to have your life wrenched away.
VIKRAM SETH -
I don’t pick and choose subjects or settings; they pick and choose me.
VIKRAM SETH -
You get your inspiration – suggestions – wherever you have to, even from your mother.
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 -
And the process of reading is such a private one. I once came into a room where a friend of mine was reading one of my books, and he clicked his tongue impatiently and shooed me off.
VIKRAM SETH -
Put your backbone where your wishbone is.
VIKRAM SETH -
I am certainly not allergic to causes – particularly on subjects such as religious intolerance.
VIKRAM SETH -
The past is the past, and he can’t make amends, only hope that the gain will outlast the damage.
VIKRAM SETH -
Boredom provides a stronger inclination to write than anything.
VIKRAM SETH -
The thing about inspiration is that it takes your mind off everything else.
VIKRAM SETH -
And an equation is the same whether it’s written in red or green ink.
VIKRAM SETH