V. S. Naipaul Quotes

Quotes about:

• One isn’t born one’s self. One is born with a mass of expectations, a mass of other people’s ideas – and you have to work through it all.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Self, Ideas, People

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

  54 Copy quote

• The only lies for which we are truly punished are those we tell ourselves.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Lying

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “In a Free State”, p.162, Pan Macmillan

  36 Copy quote

• The world is what it is; men who are nothing, who allow themselves to become nothing, have no place in it.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Men, World

  "A Bend in the River". Book by V. S. Naipaul, May 1979.

  63 Copy quote

• Most people are not really free. They are confined by the niche in the world that they carve out for themselves. They limit themselves to fewer possibilities by the narrowness of their vision.

  V. S. Naipaul

  People, Vision, World

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• Everybody is interesting for an hour, but few people can last more than two.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Two, People, Interesting

  "V.S. NAIPAUL : Wanderer Of Endless Curiosity" by R.Z. Sheppard, content.time.com. July 10, 1989.

  8 Copy quote

• After all, we make ourselves according to the ideas we have of our possibilities.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Ideas, Possibility

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “A Bend in the River”, p.94, Pan Macmillan

  25 Copy quote

• The melancholy thing about the world is that it is full of stupid people; and the world is run for the benefit of the stupid and common.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Running, Stupid, People

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• It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world. That's where the mischief starts. That's where everything starts unravelling.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Views, World, Mischief

  37 Copy quote

• Small things start us in new ways of thinking

  V. S. Naipaul

  Thinking, Way, Small Things

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• The past has to be seen to be dead; or the past will kill.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Past

  V. S. Naipaul (2017). “India: Picador Classic”, p.330, Pan Macmillan

  7 Copy quote

• An autobiography can distort; facts can be realigned. But fiction never lies: it reveals the writer totally.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Lying, Deceit, Fiction

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “The Writer and the World: Essays”, p.225, Pan Macmillan

  26 Copy quote

• I always knew who I was and where I had come from. I was not looking for a home in other people's lands.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Home, Land, People

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

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• It is important not to trust people too much.

  V. S. Naipaul

  People, Important, Too Much

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• My life is short. I can't listen to banality.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Life Is Short, Life Is, Banality

  "Naipaul lets rip at 'banality' of Indian women writers" by Fiachra Gibbons, www.theguardian.com. February 21, 2002.

  23 Copy quote

• Life is a helluva thing. You can see trouble coming and you can't do a damn thing to prevent it coming. You just got to sit and watch and wait.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Waiting, Watches, Life Is

  V. S. Naipaul, Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul (2000). “Miguel Street”, p.88, Heinemann

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• His ignorance seemed to widen with everything he read.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Ignorance

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “Half a Life”, p.50, Pan Macmillan

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• Home is, I suppose just a child's idea. A house at night, and a lamp in the house. A place to feel safe.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Children, Home, Night

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

  31 Copy quote

• Life doesn't have a neat beginning and a tidy end; life is always going on. You should begin in the middle and end in the middle, and it should be all there.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Life, Neat And Tidy, Ends

  V. S. Naipaul (2012). “Half a Life”, p.74, Pan Macmillan

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• I think when you see so many Hindu temples of the 10th century or earlier disfigured, defaced, you realise that something terrible happened. I feel the civilisation of that closed world was mortally wounded by those invasions the old world is destroyed. That has to be understood. Ancient Hindu India was destroyed.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Thinking, India, World

  26 Copy quote

• If a writer doesn't generate hostility, he is dead.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Ifs, Hostility

  25 Copy quote

• People come and go all the time; the world has always been in movement.

  V. S. Naipaul

  People, Movement, World

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• Judgment is contained in the act of trying to understand.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Trying, Judgment

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• 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

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• It's very attractive to people to be a victim. Instead of having to think out the whole situation, about history and your group and what you are doing... if you begin from the point of view of being a victim, you've got it half-made. I mean intellectually.

  V. S. Naipaul

  Mean, Thinking, Views

  "The floating man" by James Campbell, www.theguardian.com. December 15, 2007.

  19 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

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