V. S. Naipaul Quotes - Page 2

Quotes about:

• The world is always in movement.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Movement, World

  "Two worlds". Nobel lecture, www.theguardian.com. December 7, 2001.

  30 Copy quote

• I profoundly feel that people are letting you down all the time.

  V. S. Naipaul

  People, Feels

  6 Copy quote

• I will say I am the sum of my books.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Book

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “Literary Occasions: Essays”, p.189, Pan Macmillan

  25 Copy quote

• One always writes comedy at the moment of deepest hysteria.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Writing, Hysteria, Comedy

  "V.S. Naipaul in Search of Himself: A Conversation". Interview with Mel Gussow, The New York Times, April 24, 1994.

  31 Copy quote

• The Europeans wanted gold and slaves, like everybody else; but at the same time they wanted statues put up to themselves as people who had done good things for the slaves.

  V. S. Naipaul

  People, Gold, Done

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “A Bend in the River”, p.14, Pan Macmillan

  20 Copy quote

• Out of its squalor and human decay, its eruptions of butchery, India produced so many people of grace and beauty, ruled by elaborate courtesy. Producing too much life, it denied the value of life; yet it permitted a unique human development to so many. Nowhere were people so heightened, rounded and individualistic; nowhere did they offer themselves so fully and with such assurance. To know Indians was to take a delight in people as people; every encounter was an adventure. I did not want India to sink [out of my memory]; the mere thought was painful.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Memories, Adventure, Unique

  19 Copy quote

• It is important not to trust people too much.

  V. S. Naipaul

  People, Important, Too Much

  6 Copy quote

• I read a piece of writing and within a paragraph or two I know whether it is by a woman or not.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Writing, Two, Pieces

  "VS Naipaul finds no woman writer his literary match – not even Jane Austen" by Amy Fallon, www.theguardian.com. June 2, 2011.

  27 Copy quote

• You can't deny what you've learned; you can't deny your travels; you can't deny the nature of your life.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Deny

  4 Copy quote

• I have always moved by intuition alone. I have no system, literary or political. I have no guiding political idea.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Ideas, Political, Intuition

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “Literary Occasions: Essays”, p.201, Pan Macmillan

  4 Copy quote

• It has had a calamitous effect on converted peoples. To be converted you have to destroy your past, destroy your history. You have to stamp on it, you have to say 'my ancestral culture does not exist, it doesn't matter'.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Past, Doe, Culture

  "VS Naipaul withdraws from Turkish event after row over Islam comments" by Benedicte Page, www.theguardian.com. November 24, 2010.

  5 Copy quote

• Ignorant people in preppy clothes are more dangerous to America than oil embargoes.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Oil, Clothes, America

  21 Copy quote

• Making a book is such a big enterprise.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Book, Bigs, Enterprise

  "A home for Mr Naipaul". Interview with Tim Adams, www.theguardian.com. September 11, 2004.

  17 Copy quote

• One must always try to see the truth of a situation - it makes things universal.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Trying, Situation, Universal

  5 Copy quote

• The world outside existed in a kind of darkness; and we inquired about nothing.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Darkness, World, Kind

  "Two worlds" by V. S. Naipaul, www.theguardian.com. December 7, 2001.

  7 Copy quote

• That element of surprise is what I look for when I am writing. It is my way of judging what I am doing - which is never an easy thing to do.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Writing, Judging, Looks

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “Literary Occasions: Essays”, p.188, Pan Macmillan

  71 Copy quote

• Men need history; it helps them to have an idea of who they are. But history, like sanctity, can reside in the heart; it is enough that there is something there.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Heart, Men, Ideas

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “The Enigma of Arrival: A Novel in Five Sections”, p.252, Pan Macmillan

  5 Copy quote

• You need someone to see what you've done, to read it and to understand it and to appreciate what's gone into it.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Appreciate, Needs, Gone

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• Africans need to be kicked, that's the only thing they understand.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Needs

  6 Copy quote

• If ever you wish to meet intellectual frauds in quantity, go to Paris.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Paris, Intellectual, Wish

  "A singular writer". Interview with Maya Jaggi, www.theguardian.com. September 7, 2001.

  6 Copy quote

• Each book, intuitively sensed and, in the case of fiction, intuitively worked out, stands on what has gone before, and grows out of it.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Book, Gone, Fiction

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “Literary Occasions: Essays”, p.190, Pan Macmillan

  6 Copy quote

• But everything of value about me is in my books.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Book, Values

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “Literary Occasions: Essays”, p.188, Pan Macmillan

  15 Copy quote

• All cultures have been mingled forever.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Forever, Culture, Has Beens

  4 Copy quote

• I have trusted to my intuition to find the subjects, and I have written intuitively. I have an idea when I start, I have a shape; but I will fully understand what I have written only after some years.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Ideas, Years, Intuition

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “Literary Occasions: Essays”, p.189, Pan Macmillan

  11 Copy quote

• I'm thought to be a tough writer, but I'm really a softie.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Tough

  9 Copy quote

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