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Quote by Salman Rushdie

Work

Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder

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Author

Salman Rushdie
Salman Rushdie

Salman Rushdie (born June 19, 1947) is a British-Indian novelist and essayist. Known for his magical realism style, his novel Midnight's Children won the Booker Prize in 1981. His works often explore themes of cultural conflict, religion, and politics. In 1988, his novel The Satanic Verses sparked global controversy, leading to a fatwa issued by Iran's Ayatollah Khomeini calling for his assassination. Rushdie spent years in hiding under police protection. He remains a prominent voice in contemporary English literature, celebrated for his literary innovation and defense of free expression. more

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“I've written about persistence and perseverance and yet for those of us with patchwork lives (projects, earnings, caretaking, home-tending, playing, friending, loving, celebrating, hurting, grieving, healing, assessing, re-grouping) persistence and perseverance has to be allowed in patches, not what from the outside might be viewed as 'normal' (for whatever worth normal has, the top of that overused bell curve). So let me clarify. When I talk about persistence, it isn't about persistence of equal measure every day. It's about not giving up on whatever is important to you, and, especially, not giving up on yourself. Some chapters of your life may allow many facets of your being, others just cannot and the feeling of failure that can arouse is of no value. Sometimes all you can do is ask yourself: What must I do this week? today? next hour? to continue the process as healthily as possible? to accomplish the most? It may be deep immersion in one, or it may be an odd mix. And tomorrow may be different. And an unexpected gift may come and change everything. And a Mack truck may hit and change everything. Our answers to those questions may not look similar but what I hope is similar is the acceptance of what must be. Persist in your own patches. Make your own quilt.”

“All that worries you will meet if you remain alive, and you will confront it with the weapons you have acquired, those sounds that hurt you is your mind to prevent you from making a bad choice. Change begins when you blame yourself, not when you blame fate, and at the point of chaos you will choose one of two paths: the path of regret, or the path of healing. That day that you claim tomorrow will always be yesterday. Whether you do what you should or not , you'll find yourself facing what you have chosen.”