quote · Legacy record
Normality in our part of the world is a bit like a boiled egg: its humdrum surface conceals at its heart a yolk of egregious violence. It is our constant anxiety about that violence, our memory of its past labours and our dread of its future manifestations, that lays down the rules for how a people as complex and as diverse as we continue to coexist – continue to live together, tolerate each other and, from time to time, murder one another. As long as the centre holds, as long as the yolk doesn’t run, we’ll be fine. In moments of crisis it helps to take the long view.
Normality in our part of the world is a bit like a boiled egg: its humdrum surface conceals at its heart a yolk of egregious violence. It is our constant anxiety about that violence, our memory of its past labours and our dread of its future manifestations, that lays down the rules for how a people as complex and as diverse as we continue to coexist – continue to live together, tolerate each other and, from time to time, murder one another. As long as the centre holds, as long as the yolk doesn’t run, we’ll be fine. In moments of crisis it helps to take the long view.
Approximate author period: c. 1961 AD · modern
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- Author or tradition
- Arundhati Roy
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
- Not established
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- Approximate author period: c. 1961 AD · modern
Approximate author-period anchor from documented birth year 1961; activity date not established; Wikidata Q212801, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q212801 (accessed 2026-10-08). Not a quotation composition date.
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Supplied reference C; CSV row 148249; supplied attribution, independently unverified
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