Mohsin Hamid, Moth Smoke
19 quotes
"Some things are too good. They make everything else worthless."
"There's a reason prophets perform miracles: language lacks the power to describe faith. And you have to land on faith before you can even begin to hike around to its flip side, betrayal."
"I have this thing about friends and secrets. Sometimes when I meet a person I like, I tell them a secret they don't know me well enough to be told. It lets me judge their potential as a friend."
"Secrets make life more interesting. You can be in a crowded room with someone and touch them without touching, just with a look, because they know a part of you no one else knows. And whenever you're with them, the two of you are alone, because the you they see no one else can."
"Language lacks the power to describe Faith."
"Children are excellent judges of character, you know"
"When the uncertain future becomes the past, the past in turn becomes uncertain."
"When the uncertain future becomes the past, the past in turn becomes uncertain"
"I'm interested in things women do that aren't spoken about. Manto's stories let me breathe. They make me feel like less of a monster."
"You see, it is my passionately held belief that the right to possess property is at best a contingent one. When disparities become too great, a superior right, that to life, outweighs the right to property. Ergo, the very poor have the right to steal from the very rich."
"The mountain trembled like an earthquake. Dust flew into the sky. And the rock turned dark red, like the color of blood'. 'How would you know?' Asks Sindhi cap. 'You only have a black and white television'.'But it's a very good one. You can almost see colours."
"And with a last stardrop, a last circle, I arrive, and she's there, chemical wonder in her eyes."
"Some men drink the blood of other men, all I drink is wine."
"Pride tells me to give it back, but common sense tells pride to shut up, have a joint and relax. I shrug and put the note into my wallet."
"I push against the tree and run away, stumbling, the unreal night playing with me, gravity pulling from below, behind, above, making me fall. And I run through a world that is rotating, conscious of the earth's spin, of our planet twirling as it careens through nothingness, of the stars spiraling above, of the uncertainty of everything, even ground, even sky. Mumtaz never calls out, although a thousand and one voices scream in my mind, sing, whisper, taunt me with madness."
"I commit her to memory. When I'm alone, I feel a strange yearning, the hunger of a man fasting not because he believes but because he's ashamed. Not the cleansing hunger of the devout, but the feverish hunger of the hypocrite. I let her go every evening only because there's nothing I can do to stop her."
"If differences can be hidden, perhaps there aren't differences at all"
"Didn't you tell me smoking ruined your stamina as a boxer? ...Ruined is a strong word, I'd say....It helps fight boredom. It gives you more to do and less time to do it in."
"Many boys, probably most boys, have a first love before they fall in love with a woman. It begins the moment two boys realize they'd die for one another, that each cares more for the other than he does for himself, and it lasts usually until a second love comes on the scene, because most hearts aren't big enough to love more than one person like that."