1
" In his essay,Agastya had said that his real ambition was to be a domesticated male stray dog because they lived the best life.They were assured of food,and because they were stray they didn't have to guard a house or beg or shake paws or fetch trifles or be clean or anything similarly meaningless to earn their food.They were servile and sycophantic when hungry;once fed,and before sleep,they wagged their tails perfunctorily whenever their hosts passes,as an investment for future meals.A stray dog was free,he slept a lot,barked unexpectedly and only when he wanted to,and got a lot of sex. "
― Upamanyu Chatterjee , English, August: An Indian Story
3
" Most of us, Ogu, live with a vague dissatisfaction, if we are lucky. Living as we do, upon us is imposed a particular rhythm - birth, education, a job, marriage, then birth again, but we all have minds don't we?
For most Indians of your age, just getting any job is enough. You were more fortunate for you had options before you.
These sound like paternal homilies, don't they, but you've always had surrogate parents, your aunts, and then in Delhi, your Pultukaku, and we've not really spent much time together. "
― Upamanyu Chatterjee , English, August: An Indian Story
13
" That men at some time are masters of their fates was no longer merely a famous quotation. The idea haunted him, continually taunting him to confront it, but his mind responded only dully, in slow ineffective spasms. He did not know whether he should resign himself to his world, and to the rhythm that, living as we do, is imposed upon us, or whether he should believe in the mere words of an ancient Hindu poem, which held that action was better than inaction. "
― Upamanyu Chatterjee , English, August: An Indian Story
15
" Yet one more encounter with new faces, he thought, as he watched a tree and a cloud move past in slow motion, and eventually this one would also blur into the others; all that would remain distinct, perhaps, would be a few words that only he would deem significant, or an angle of a face, which in turn his mind would link with other things, some oddity of accent, or some other words confusing time and place and people to look for a pattern, some essence. "
― Upamanyu Chatterjee , English, August: An Indian Story
