V. S. Naipaul quotes - page 4

Islam is in its origins an Arab religion. Everyone not an Arab who is a Muslim is a convert. Islam is not simply a matter of conscience or private belief. It makes imperial demands. A convert's worldview alters. His holy places are in Arab lands; his sacred language is Arabic. His idea of history alters. He rejects his own; he becomes, whether he likes it or not, a part of the Arab story. The convert has to turn away from everything that is his. The disturbance for societies is immense, and even after a thousand years can remain unresolved; the turning away has to be done again and again. People develop fantasies about who and what they are; and in the Islam of converted countries there is an element of neurosis and nihilism. These countries can be easily set on the boil. (V. S. Naipaul)
Whenever I have had to write fiction, I've always had to invent a character who roughly has my background. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
Whatever extra there is in me at any given moment isn't fully formed. I am hardly aware of it; it awaits the next book. It will - with luck - come to me during the actual writing, and it will take me by surprise. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
The universal civilization has been a long time in the making. It wasn't always universal; it wasn't always as attractive as it is today. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
I'm thought to be a tough writer, but I'm really a softie. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
If you write a novel alone you sit and you weave a little narrative. And it's O.K., but it's of no account. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
My publisher, who was so good as a taster and editor, when she became a writer, lo and behold, it was all this feminine tosh. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
In a way my reputation has become that of the curmudgeon. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
If you decide to move to another country and to live within its laws you don't express your disregard for the essence of the culture. It's a form of aggression. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
I read many things. I read to fill in my knowledge of the world. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
Africa is not a fun place, you know. A fun place is somewhere that lifts the spirits, that cossets the senses. I don't think that can be said of the Africa I traveled in. (V. S. Naipaul)
All the things that were read to me by my father were stories about things becoming all right. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
At school I had only admirers; I had no friends. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
Trinidad may seem complex, but to anyone who knows it, it is a simple, colonial, philistine society. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
Some writers can only deal with childhood experience, because it's complete. For another kind of writer, life goes on, and he's able to keep processing that as well. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
Great writing can be done in biography, history, art. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
The ancillary aspect of every British city now is the council estate. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
I know my father and my mother, but beyond that I cannot go. My ancestry is blurred. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
If a man begins writing at thirty, by the time he is fifty or sixty, the bulk of his work has been done. By the time he is eighty, he's got nothing more, you know? View quote
V. S. Naipaul
I've been a free man. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
I went to India and met some people who had been involved in this guerrilla business, middle-class people who were rather vain and foolish. There was no revolutionary grandeur to it. Nothing. (V. S. Naipaul)
I have a very small public. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
Writing has to support itself. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
I profoundly feel that people are letting you down all the time. View quote
V. S. Naipaul
Africans need to be kicked, that's the only thing they understand. View quote
V. S. Naipaul