A Full Night's Thievery Quotes

“Sing a song of justice, why don't you, but remember there are many ways of measuring the worth of a man. Or a woman. Not just the poet's way. Not just the scientist's way. But a bit of both, and then some. And all of us have to tread the paths that are most suited to us.”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories

“Music is a harsh taskmaster, one that doesn't acknowledge the ties of friendship or family.”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories

“Money. It's a poor compensation for absence, especially when it's not needed.”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories

“It's easy enough to catch a man, I want to tell the girl with the moonlight skin and monsoon hair. Not difficult at all, if you set your mind to it. What is difficult is to sustain the passion, keep the relationship going. Your body will be ravaged, oh yes it will, by that beast, Time. Your wiles, your enticements, will stale. You will become familiar, commonplace, ordinary. Your quickening breath will fail to excite, the circle of your arms will constrict.

No, I don't hate you, not at all. Why should I? I see the end drawing near for you, my little sister. And then, as I had always known I would, I, Annapurna, will win.”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories

“Can desire and a need that cannot be denied pound through a man's veins in the same way if the woman before him sits demurely draped in domesticity? Can lust become a madness that sinks every sane thought in the mind, can it become an all-consuming thirst that rages through every cell, not to be denied, if the woman sits there with sendur in her hair, legitimately his, to be taken right then, if he so wishes? Can, indeed, a woman chosen by parents and family ever be an object of lust in the same way a woman forbidden to him, a woman with silken hill skin and monsoon hair? No. Of course she cannot.”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories

“...food, and plenty of it, is what is central to our lives, isn't it? Without food, without nourishment, nothing would be. Not thoughts, not ideas, not emotions, not existence. Not even love.”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories

“And then, perhaps, in some other Bohag, under some other Bihu sky, we can meet again, in companionship and in joy.”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories

“Who knows when babies decide to come into the world?”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories

“Of course, it wasn't as though the town consisted of upright and learned people only. Like any other self-respecting town, it had a thief as well. For having a local thief was a marker of the affluence of the town itself.”
― Mitra Phukan, A Full Night's Thievery: Stories