602 Quotes by Arundhati Roy

I would like to write one of those sophisticated stories in which even though nothing much happens there’s lots to write about.

The doors had not two, but four shutters of paneled teak so that in the old days, ladies could keep the bottom half closed, lean their elbows on the ledge and bargain with visiting vendors without betraying themselves below the waist. Technically, they could buy carpets, or bangles, with their breasts covered and their bottoms bare. Technically.

There are other worlds. Other kinds of dreams. Dreams in which failure is feasible. Honourable. Sometimes even worth striving for. Worlds in which recognition is not the only barometer of brilliance or human worth.

D’you know what happens when you hurt people?’ Ammu said. ‘When you hurt people, they begin to love you less. That’s what careless words do. They make people love you a little less.

But it’s hard to say where experience ends and imagination begins. The story is by no means a true story. But the feelings in it are.

When you say things like, ‘We have to wipe out the Taliban,’ what does that mean? The Taliban is not a fixed number of people. The Taliban is an ideology that has sprung out of a history that, you know, America created anyway.

Sometimes there’s truth in old cliches. There can be no real peace without justice. And without resistance there will be no justice.

She wore flowers in her hair and carried magic secrets in her eyes.

The foreign newspapers had dumped the old exotics in favor of the younger generation. The exotics didn’t suit the image of the New India – a nuclear power and an emerging destination for international finance. Ustad.