Torture presupposes, it requires, it craves the abrogation of our capacity to imagine others suffering, dehumanizing them so much that their pain is not our pain. It demands this of the torturer, placing the victim outside and beyond any form of compassion or empathy, but also demands of everyone else the same distancing, the same numbness.

I feel as if I can take Indian stories, make them mine and take them to the world.

Most writers who leave their country physically have already left it mentally and emotionally.

There's a tendency, especially among revolutionaries, to only show the good side of yourself and then when you come to power, the bad side comes out.

We live in the age of the refugee, the age of the exile.

I don't believe in God, but I believe in angels.

Those who have never suffered the iniquities of exile cannot possibly understand the significance, the gravitas, of a mattress.