Jhumpa Lahiri Quotes - Page 3

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Books Mothers Parents Writing

There were times Ruma felt closer to her mother in death than she had in life, an intimacy born simply of thinking of her so often, of missing her. But she knew that this was an illusion, a mirage, and that the distance between them was now infinite, unyielding.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Mother, Distance, Thinking

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One hand, five homes. A lifetime in a fist.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Home, Hands, Fists

Jhumpa Lahiri (2004). “The Namesake: A Novel”, p.167, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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Try to remember it always," he said once Gogol had reached him, leading him slowly back across the breakwater, to where his mother and Sonia stood waiting. "Remember that you and I made this journey together to a place where there was nowhere left to go.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Mother, Journey, Waiting

Jhumpa Lahiri (2004). “The Namesake: A Novel”, p.187, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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He tries to peel the image from the sticky yellow backing, to show her the next time he sees her, but it clings stubbornly, refusing to detach cleanly from the past.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Past, Yellow, Trying

FaceBook post by Jhumpa Lahiri from Jan 03, 2014

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She supposed that all those years of loving a person who was dishonest had taught her a few things.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Years, Taught, Persons

Jhumpa Lahiri (2008). “Unaccustomed Earth”, p.318, Vintage

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While the astronauts, heroes forever, spent mere hours on the moon, I have remained in this new world for nearly thirty years. I know that my achievement is quite ordinary. I am not the only man to seek his fortune far from home, and certainly I am not the first. Still, there are times I am bewildered by each mile I have traveled, each meal I have eaten, each person I have known, each room in which I have slept. As ordinary as it all appears, there are times when it is beyond my imagination." (from "The Third and Final Continent")

Jhumpa Lahiri

Hero, Home, Moon

FaceBook post by Jhumpa Lahiri from Aug 05, 2011

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My grandfather says that's what books are for," Ashoke said, using the opportunity to open the volume in his hands. "To travel without moving an inch.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Moving, Book, Opportunity

Jhumpa Lahiri (2004). “The Namesake: A Novel”, p.16, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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I've seen novels that have grown out of one story in a collection. But it hasn't occurred to me to take any of those stories and build on them. They seem very finished for me, so I don't feel like going back and dredging them up.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Stories, Dredging, Novel

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Gogol is unaccustomed to this sort of talk at mealtimes, to the indulgent ritual of the lingering meal, and the pleasant aftermath of bottles and crumbs and empty glasses that clutter the table.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Glasses, Meals, Aftermath

Jhumpa Lahiri (2004). “The Namesake: A Novel”, p.134, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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Amid the gray, an incongruous band of daytime blue asserts itself. To the west, a pink sun already begins its descent. The effect is of three isolated aspects, distinct phases of the day. All of it, strewn across the horizon, is contained in his vision.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Blue, Vision, Three

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She has the gift of accepting her life.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Namesake, Accepting

Jhumpa Lahiri (2003). “The Namesake”, p.138, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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On the screen I saw tanks rolling through dusty streets, and fallen buildings, and forests of unfamiliar trees into which East Pakistani refugees had fled, seeking safety over the Indian border.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Safety, Tree, Tanks

Jhumpa Lahiri (2000). “Interpreter of Maladies”, p.31, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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It's easy to set a story anywhere if you get a good guidebook and get some basic street names, and some descriptions, but, for me, yes, I am indebted to my travels to India for several of the stories.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Names, India, Stories

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She is stunned that in this town there are no sidewalks to speak of, no streetlights, no public transportation, no stores for miles at at a time.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Towns, Speak, Namesake

Jhumpa Lahiri (2004). “The Namesake: A Novel”, p.49, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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A writer has to true to him or herself. Period. That’s it!

Jhumpa Lahiri

Periods

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I wanted to pull away from the things that marked my parents as being different.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Parent, Being Different, Different

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A lot of my upbringing was about denying or fretting or evading.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Fretting, Upbringing

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I don't know why, but the older I get the more interested I get in my parents' marriage. And it's interesting to be married yourself, too, because there is an inevitable comparison.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Parents Marriage, Interesting, Married

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She learned that an act intended to express love could have nothing to do with it. That her heart and her body were different things.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Heart, Different, Body

Jhumpa Lahiri (2013). “The Lowland”, p.162, A&C Black

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In the days that follow, he begins to remember things about Moushumi, images that come to him without warning while he is sitting at his desk at work, or during a meeting, or drifting off to sleep, or standing in the mornings under the shower. They are scenes he has carried within him, buried but intact, scenes he has never thought about or had reason to conjure up until now.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Morning, Sleep, Drifting Off

Jhumpa Lahiri (2003). “The Namesake”, p.200, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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Gogol remembers having to do the same thing when he was younger, when his grandparents died...He remembers, back then, being bored by it, annoyed at having to observe a ritual no one else he knew followed, in honor of people he had seen only a few times in his life...Now, sitting together at the kitchen table at six-thirty every evening, his father's chair empty, this meatless meal is the only thing that seems to make sense.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Father, People, Grandparent

"The Namesake". Book by Jhumpa Lahiri, 2003.

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I always think first about the nature of the story. When I had the idea for 'The Namesake,' I felt that it had to be a novel - it couldn't work as a story.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Thinking, Ideas, Stories

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On a sticky August evening two weeks before her due date, Ashima Ganguli stands in the kitchen of a Central Square apartment, combining Rice Krispies and Planters peanuts and chopped red onion in bowl.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Squares, August, Two

FaceBook post by Jhumpa Lahiri from May 13, 2012

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And wasn't it terrible, how much he looked forward to those moments, so much so that sometimes even a ride by himself on the subway was the best part of the day? Wasn't it terrible that after all the work one put into finding a person to spend one's life with, after making a family with that person, even in spite of missing that person...that solitude was what one relished the most, the only thing that, even in fleeting, diminished doses, kept one sane?

Jhumpa Lahiri

Missing, Solitude, Fleeting

FaceBook post by Jhumpa Lahiri from Feb 12, 2012

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She watched his lips forming the words, at the same time she heard them under her skin, under her winter coat, so near and full of warmth that she felt herself go hot.

Jhumpa Lahiri

Winter, Skins, Hot

Jhumpa Lahiri (2000). “Interpreter of Maladies”, p.91, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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Born: July 11, 1967
Occupation: Author
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