Top 34 Quotes & Sayings by Khushwant Singh

But big people’s illnesses are always made to sound big. The simple shutting and opening of the royal arse-hole was made to sound as if the world was coming to an end.

Freedom is for the educated people who fought for it. We were slaves of the English, now we will be slaves of the educated Indians—or the Pakistanis.

I still think that the point of reference for every Indian when he is in doubt on any political or social issue is to say, "What would [Mahatma] Gandhi have done under the circumstances?" I didn't subscribe to his fads - prohibition, celibacy, no doctors - but generally he was always right. He meant more to me than any of my gurus.

The last to learn of gossip are the parties concerned

I was under police security for 15 years because I was on their hit-list. I opposed Khalistan because I thought it would be suicide for the Sikh community to demand a separate state, and they heard me because they knew I was one of them. I think I turned round at least the intelligent Sikh's point of view and that gave me enormous satisfaction.

I've had very little sex. I like my Scotch, but I've never been drunk.

I discovered that a diplomat's life is largely entertaining and meeting people. At the end of the day there's nothing. So I gave up.

I admit I have no forgiveness. If anyone is ever rude to me, however much they may try to make up, I can't bring myself to re-establish the old [connection]. And when they drop me, I have a sense of relief.

I use vulgar language in my writing. Or for people I don't like, but I have never had an outburst of anger and I think that's largely [Mahatma] Gandhi's influence. When you lose your temper, you've lost your cause.

I am alone, but never lonely. You have always books around you.

I was never a cardholder. But I was leftist in the sense that I voted communist.

[Sex] is of real interest to every human being and so why gloss over it, and it's fun, it's interesting, it has so many dimensions.

I think the sense of belonging does give you a certain amount of mental satisfaction.

I acquired long-lived parents. My mother died at 94. Father died at 90, holding a glass of whisky. I think that's the secret of longevity - to have long-lived parents. The rest is discipline.

Friends meddle with my plan of work. I resent people dropping in for a chat.

Morality is a matter of money. Poor people cannot afford to have morals. So they have religion.

I am prolific. Any rubbish I write gets published, so books keep churning out.

Your principle should be to see everything and say nothing. The world changes so rapidly that if you want to get on you cannot afford to align yourself with any person or point of view.

When the world is itself draped in the mantle of night, the mirror of the mind is like the sky in which thoughts twinkle like stars.

That's Delhi. When life gets too much for you all you need to do is to spend an hour at Nigambodh Ghat,watch the dead being put to flames and hear their kin wail for them. Then come home and down a couple of pegs of whisky. In Delhi, death and drink make life worth living.

I had lots of time to read [being a lawyer] what I hadn't read in my school and college days. Being a bad student I barely passed my exams and I barely bothered about books. It was sports all the time. I started reading and got involved in literature and writing. The few cases I handled gave me the material for my early short stories.

No one has invented a condom for the pen yet. My pen is still sexy.

I have never, in 50 years, ever missed a deadline [as a journalist].

I was unhappy with the jobs I did after law. I got into the diplomatic service. There again I had really little to do.

If you look at things as they are, there does not seem to be a code either of man or of God on which one can pattern one's conduct. Wrong triumphs over right as much as right over wrong. Sometimes its triumphs are greater. What happens ultimately, you do not know. In such circumstances what can you do but cultivate an utter indifference to all values? Nothing matters. Nothing whatever.

I don't want to be cremated, I want to be buried. I don't believe in wasting wood and I feel that one should give back to the earth.

When you have counted eighty years and more, Time and Fate will batter at your door; But if you should survive to be a hundred, Your life will be death to the very core.

I did subscribe to the freedom movement and I was much closer to the Congress than to the Akali party. It is a communal party.

Not forever does the bulbul sing In balmy shades of bowers, Not forever lasts the spring Nor ever blossom the flowers. Not forever reigneth joy, Sets the sun on days of bliss, Friendships not forever last, They know not life, who know not this.

I have never lost my temper. I let out my venom in my writing if I have to, but person-to-person, I have never lost my temper, never used abusive language.

I turned to the Partition experiences, which were churning in my mind. Then came my first novel Train to Pakistan.

I am not a serious person. I don't claim any profundity for any of my writing.

I haven't any close friends. Friendship needs time to interact, sit down, gossip. I don't have that time.

Nature provides that a man who slaves all day should spend the hours of the night in a palace full of houris whereas a king who wields the sceptre by day should have his sleep disturbed by nightmares of rebellion and assassination.