British - Novelist | 1969 -
I'm fascinated by the emergence of a global class. They're highly mobile; they reject the idea of place.
Hari Kunzru
PlaceClassMobileGlobalIdea
I can see a version of my life where it all becomes meaningless. On a good day, writing seems noble. Other times, it's narcissistic and pointless.
LifeGoodDayGood DayWritingSee
Suburbia is all about private ownership and not having to share, and it leads to a paranoid, defensive mindset. I know this, having grown up in Essex.
MindsetOwnershipKnowUpShare
I suffer from vertigo. It's paralyzing in extreme situations. The most scared I've been as an adult was trying to conquer that fear by going climbing in Wales.
FearConquerTryingScaredGoing
Being in Harlem on the night of Barack Obama's election was extraordinary. It was the best street party I have ever gone to, and it felt like the period of American history which began with slavery had ended that evening.
HistoryBestSlaveryNightEvening
There's nothing New York likes more than a thing. Or a place. Or a place that's a thing. Or a thing that happens to be a place.
New YorkPlaceNewNothingMore
Say there are three identical-looking pizza joints on a street. Two of those will always be empty. The third will have a line of people patiently waiting, checking their phones. There's always one place that's the place. That's how it works.
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When I try to understand somebody, create a character, I fall into them. When I think writers are telling me what to think, I get harrumphy.
CharacterMeThinkFallCreateTry
I like moral judgment to emerge from the reader. We are being sold a very simplistic morality by our leaders at a time when nuance and understanding are at a premium.
TimeUnderstandingMoralityMoral
There are still some terrible cliches in the presentation of Indian fiction. The lotus flower. The hennaed hands. In mainland Europe, people still slap these images on my books and I go bananas.
FlowerPeopleHandsGoPresentation
I tried to take seriously the idea that if you tortured language you might arrive at some new truth. Later it became clear to me that I was retreading ground by fighting the literary battles of the 1950s and 1960s, and that I was actually a bit bored by some of the books I professed to love.
LoveTruthMeLanguageFightingYou
Some books I've kept because the binding is beautiful - I'm unlikely ever to read my grandmother's copy of 'The Life of Lord Nelson.' I'm addicted to secondhand bookshops.
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