Equal of the Sun Quotes

“Shamkhal and Majeed exchanged a glance of excitement and Majeed leapt up, his face glowing with triumph, to repeat what Ibrahim had said to another noble, and then he sped to the other side of the room to make sure the words traveled from man to man.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“These were the nobles of our land, the men whose presence had filled me with adulation when I was a child. Now I knew that despite all their gold and titles and weapons, they quaked with fear. Brave men were rare indeed.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“God had created perfection in man, but time on earth ate away at him, part by part, until finally nothing remained and he vanished into spirit. Yet there was glory in being half, not whole, glory in the task of it.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“Don’t the poets describe the fairest men and women in exactly the same way?” I teased back. “They have rosebud lips, cheeks as red as apples, large, soulful eyes, dark velvety eyebrows, curly black hair, and a beauty mark just like yours.”

Her long, throaty laugh kept me company as she descended the stairs. As it faded I wondered, if boys and girls were so similar as love objects, both in painting and in poetry, why were they treated so differently when they grew into men and women? What was the difference between having a tool and not having one?”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“Perhaps, you don’t realize how children change. They start life attached to your body, but grow into foreigners.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“The palace women scrubbed each other’s backs, drew henna designs on each other’s bodies, helped each other through the screaming pain of birth, washed each other’s dead, and held each other’s hands in moments of joy and grief… They lived in such a deep state of feeling for each other, whether love or hate, that it surrounded them like the weather.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“People love to dwell on the pain of others; they love to stick their fingers in it and suck on it as if it were honey. But I won’t allow them to feed at my hive.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“May God punish you for this first of your sins!” Hossein Beyg shouted, his words falling on the room like a curse. “May you fear for your life every day you are Shah. May your children be murdered without mercy, just as you have condemned me. Men of the court, take heed! You will be next if you don’t root out this viper in your midst.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“I don’t have royal blood,” I told her, “but we two could have been twins. It was as if we swam in the same fluids in our mother ’s womb, so that some of my maleness became hers and some of her femaleness mine. That made us strange in the eyes of the world, which does not care for in-between beings. We have both taken blows because of it. She was protean, as am I. She was fierce and affectionate and smart and unpredictable. That is why I loved her . . . that is why!”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“I recognized the poem from Maulana Rumi and felt touched to the depths of my heart when I realized that Pari was committing both of us to God’s care. “I will never abandon you. You are the star that I follow always.” Pari’s eyes misted. “Yes,” she said softly, “you alone of all my servants have truly loved me.” “With all my heart.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“But when I allowed myself to think of her, I remembered the delicacy of her brown body under her orange robe, and I drew courage from knowing that she had needed nothing to guide her but her determined heart. Had there ever been a man who could claim to be as fearless? She had never even held the heavy swords and sharp daggers that gave soldiers their swagger. Khadijeh may have been a slave, but in her heart, she was a lion-woman.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun

“But when I allowed
myself to think of her, I remembered the delicacy of her brown body under her orange robe, and I
drew courage from knowing that she had needed nothing to guide her but her determined heart. Had
there ever been a man who could claim to be as fearless? She had never even held the heavy swords
and sharp daggers that gave soldiers their swagger. Khadijeh may have been a slave, but in her heart,
she was a lion-woman.”
― Anita Amirrezvani, Equal of the Sun