People can be extraordinarily resilient and show extraordinary grace and humour even in moments of tribulation. I've always found that it's much easier for people who are not terribly, badly off to lose hope and to be pessimistic. I suppose that when you are in a really serious situation, you have to be present, you have to think about it, there's not much scope for self-pity.
Arundhati RoyIn India, whichever language you write in, the possibility of people not understanding irony or not understanding [remains there]. This as a writer is most terrifying!
Arundhati RoyImpelled by feelings that were primal yet paradoxically wholly impersonal. Feelings of contempt born of inchoate, unacknowledged fear--civilization's fear of nature, men's fear of women, power's fear of powerlessness. Man's subliminal urge to destroy what he could neither subdue nor deify.
Arundhati RoyThe revolution cannot be funded. It's not the imagination of trusts and foundations that's going to bring real change.
Arundhati Roy