01UndatedJust as my body had changed at puberty, now I was developing a sense of guilt, a sense not only of how I appeared to others, but of how I appeared to myself, especially in violating self-imposed prohibitions.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
02UndatedWomen only wear beautiful clothes so that men will want to remove them.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
04UndatedMamoon went on, “The news I bring is to say that, man being the only animal who hates himself, the likely fate of the world is total self-destruction.” He raised his glass. “All the best then, my friends. Here’s to a happy apocalypse.”“Happy apocalypse,” murmured the other guests, obediently.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
05UndatedI didn't want to be educated. It wasn't the right time of my life for concentration, it really wasn't. The spirit of the age among the people I knew manifested itself as general drift and idleness. We didn't want money. What for? We could get by, living off parents, friends or the State And if we were going to be bored, and we were usually bored, rarely being self-motivated, we could at least be bored on our own terms, lying smashed on mattresses in ruined houses rather than working in the machine. I didn't want to work in a place where I couldn't wear my fur coat.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
07UndatedFalling in love was simple; one had only to yield. Digesting another person, however, and sustaining love, was bloody work, and not a soft job.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
08UndatedPlato, along with the latest pope, recognised how dangerous it is to have an artist around making mischief, stirring things up with the spoon of truth and intoxicant of fantasy and magic. And so, for crossing the line, and for stealing God’s fire, artists were banned, imprisoned, condemned, silenced, killed – they always would be, these sometimes Christs of the page.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
09UndatedThe writer, indeed every real artist, was the devil, rivalling God in creativity, trying even to surpass him. God was surely man’s most fatal creation, the devil’s kitsch bitch. It was God, with his insistence on being worshipped and admired, who made the argument of art necessary, keeping the fire of dissent alive in men and women. This dissident was the artist, who spanned with his imagination reason and unreason, the under and the over, the dream and the world, men and women.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
13UndatedHe died at the wrong time, when there was much to be clarified and established. They hadn’t even started to be grown-ups together. There was this piece of heaven, this little girl he’d carried around the shop on his shoulders; and then one day she was gone, replaced by a foreigner, an uncooperative woman he didn’t know how to speak to. Being so confused, so weak, so in love, he chose strength and drove her away from himself. The last years he spent wondering where she’d gone, and slowly came to realise that she would never return, and that the husband he’d chosen for her was an idiot.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
14UndatedMaybe you never stop feeling like an eight-year-old in front of your parents. You resolve to be your mature self, to react in this considered way rather than that elemental way, to breathe evenly from the bottom of your stomach and to see your parents as equals, but within five minutes your intentions are blown to hell, and you're babbling and screaming in rage like an angry child.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
15UndatedPopeye the Sailor Man has more cultural longevity. Only women and poofs read or write now. Otherwise, these days, no sooner has someone been sodomised by a close relative than they think they can write a memoir. The game’s up.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
16UndatedAct – make an event. Smash the coordinates and see where the smithereens fly. Let in the madness, and be sure to be a danger to oneself and others. Too much thinking turns you into that fool Hamlet.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
17UndatedI’m using Mao as my inspiration. “Cast away illusions. Prepare for struggle.” I’m back in business, baby. You don’t know you’re stuck until you get moving.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
18UndatedThe city blew the windows of my brain wide open. But being in a place so bright, fast and brilliant made you vertiginous with possibility: it didn't necessarily help you grasp those possibilities. I still had no idea what I was going to do. I felt directionless and lost in the crowd. I couldn't yet see how the city worked, but I began to find out.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
19UndatedI’ve said before, Harry, no need to hide your light,” said Alice, squeezing his hand. She giggled, “Dance, monkey, dance.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
20UndatedI admired him more than anyone but I didn't wish him well. It was that I preferred him to me and wanted to be him. I coveted his talents, face, style. I wanted to wake up with them all transferred to me.Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
21UndatedHow many artists have created while drunk, high on laudanum, opium, chloral or amphetamines? What have antidepressants ever done for culture?Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
23UndatedI know love is dark work; you have to get your hands dirty. If you hold back, nothing interesting happens. At the same time, you have to find the right distance between people. Too close, and they overwhelm you; too far and they abandon you. How to hold them in the right relation?Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
24UndatedI can only think how good life on earth can be, at times. What grief two people can give to one another! And what pleasure!Hanif Kureishi / quote ↗
