“In so many ways, his family’s life feels like a string of accidents, unforeseen, unintended, one incident begetting another.” — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
The urge to convert experience into a group of words that are in a grammatical relation to one another is the most… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“The fact that the yellow chintz armchair in the living room clashed with the blue-and-maroon Turkish carpet no longer bothered her.” — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“Pet names are a persistent remnant of childhood, a reminder that life is not always so serious, so formal, so complicated.” — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“Everything in Bela's life has been a reaction. I am who I am, she would say, I live as I do because… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“She wished the days and months ahead of her would end. But the rest of her life continued to present itself, time… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
Pet names are a persistant remnant of childhood, a reminder that life is not always so serious, so formal, so complicated. They… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
I've inherited a sense of that loss from my parents because it was so palpable all the time while I was growing… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“She wanted to shut her eyes to it. She wished the days and months ahead of her would end. But the rest… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
I've never had Internet access. Actually, I have looked at things on other people's computers as a bystander. A few times in… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
There were times Ruma felt closer to her mother in death than she had in life, an intimacy born simply of thinking… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
And yet he had loved her. A Bookish girl heedless of her beauty, unconscious of her effect. She'd been prepared to live… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
And yet she could not forgive herself. Even as an adult, she wished only that she could go back and change things:… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
It was not in my nature to be an assertive person. I was used to looking to others for guidance, for influence,… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“He regretted his surliness when she had refused. She was the only person he’d met in his adult life who had any… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“Did you have to try for a while?” He thought it a bold question, coming from a stranger. But he was honest… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“In so many ways, his family's life feels like a string of accidents, unforeseen, unintended, one incident begetting another...They were things for… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share Image
“Assured by his grades and his apparent indifference to girls, his parents don't suspect Gogol of being, in his own fumbling way, an American… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
...that in spite of living in a mansion an American is not above wearing a pair of secondhand pants, bought for fifty cents. — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
He owned an expensive camera that required thought before you pressed the shutter, and I quickly became his favorite subject, round-faced, missing teeth, my… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
If I stop to think about fans, or best-selling, or not best-selling, or good reviews, or not-good reviews, it just becomes too much. It's… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
“This tradition doesn't exist for Bengalis, naming a son after father or grandfather, a daughter after mother or grandmother. This sign of respect in… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
I wanted to pull away from the things that marked my parents as being different. — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
“Ashoke suspects that Mrs. Jones (the secretary at his new job as a professor) ...is about his own mother's age. Mrs. Jones leads a… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
But she has gathered that Americans, in spite of their public declarations of affection, in spite of their miniskirts and bikinis, in spite of… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
The sky was different, without color, taut and unforgiving. But the water was the most unforgiving thing, nearly black at times, cold enough, I… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
“In those six weeks I regarded her arrival as I would the arrival of a coming month, or season - something inevitable, but meaningless… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
There were times Ruma felt closer to her mother in death than she had in life, an intimacy born simply of thinking of her… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
“Writing down call numbers with short pencils, searching up and down aisles that would turn dark when the timers on the lights expired. She… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
Winning the Pulitzer is wonderful and it's an honor and I feel so humbled and so grateful, but I think that I'll think of… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
He tries to peel the image from the sticky yellow backing, to show her the next time he sees her, but it clings stubbornly,… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
“If I stop to think about fans, or bestselling, or not bestselling, or good reviews, or not-good reviews, it just becomes too much. It's… — Jhumpa Lahiri Copy Share
