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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Vaseem Khan
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January 31, 2020 - February 3, 2021
The idea of appearing incompetent bothered her far more than being murdered or assaulted in the line of duty, a gruesome eventuality that Aunt Nussie predicted on a daily basis.
It was everything a colonial portrait might hope to express. Grandeur, sophistication, benevolence and disdain.
Sam Wadia was just one of millions of educated Indians who had found the scales dashed from their eyes. For Sam Wadia had once admired the British, had held them up as the epitome of all that Indians might aspire to. It had only come to him later in life that this admiration was the result of a sense of self-loathing planted within him by three hundred years of colonial rule.
Inflame a man’s passion and you can make him do anything. Jinnah liked to appeal to people’s intellectualism. The fact is that most cannot see past the ends of their own noses. But tell them they stand to regain their souls, and they’ll burn down an empire for you.’
‘India is a dream, Persis. A dream we all agreed to dream together. But dreams evaporate upon awakening. It might be strange for you to hear the Deputy Home Minister say this, but the truth is that harmony in our new republic is all but impossible. We are too divided, too factionalised, too fractured by our recent experiences. And yet we must make the effort. For we cannot move forward without it.’
The rich fought tooth-and-nail to hold on to what they had; the poor lashed out in mindless fury, victims of their own ignorance.
Her father had always reasoned that if anyone was minded enough to steal books, either they were in dire need of them but could not afford them – in which case they were welcome to them – or, if they happened to be confused thieves, then it was better to have well-read thieves roaming the city than illiterate ones.
‘Aut viam inveniam aut faciam. Either find a way or make one.’
Evil could only flourish if the world colluded with it.
Her father was a committed misanthrope. A plaque on his desk read: I once considered suicide. But then I thought it would be better to kill the rest of mankind instead.
