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Ruth Prawer Jhabvala Quotes

Powerful Ruth Prawer Jhabvala for Daily Growth

About Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Ruth Prawer Jhabvala (born Ruth Prawer, July 12, 1927 – April 3, 2013) was a prolific Anglo-Indian novelist, screenwriter, and short story writer. Born in Vienna, Austria to Jewish parents, she spent her early childhood in Berlin before the family moved to England due to increasing anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany. Jhabvala's literary influences were diverse, ranging from Russian novelists like Tolstoy and Chekhov, to modernist writers such as Virginia Woolf and E.M. Forster, who she later collaborated with on screenplays for films like "A Room with a View" and "Howards End." In 1951, Jhabvala married Cyrus Sinai Jhabvala, an Indian architect, and moved to India, where she spent the next 20 years. This period greatly influenced her writing, particularly in terms of themes like cultural identity, class, and tradition. Her first novel, "To Whom She Will," was published in 1955. Her most acclaimed works include a series of novels collectively known as 'The Holdswhorth Saga,' which explore the lives of an English family over several generations. Notable among these are "East Wind, West Wind" (1968) and "Heat and Dust" (1975), for which she won her first Booker Prize. Jhabvala's collaborative work with James Ivory and Ismail Merchant on Merchant Ivory Productions resulted in numerous award-winning films, including "The Bostonians," "Maurice," "A Room with a View," "Howards End," and "The Remains of the Day." For her screenwriting efforts, she won two Academy Awards for Best Adapted Screenplay. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala's literary and cinematic contributions continue to resonate, offering insightful explorations of cultural clashes, personal relationships, and the complexities of identity in the context of a changing world.

Interpretations of Popular Quotes

"The past has an unfailing way of rushing up to meet you."

This quote emphasizes that the past, despite seemingly being left behind, has a propensity to re-emerge or influence our present experiences in unexpected ways. It suggests that we can never fully escape from the impact of our past as it often plays a role in shaping our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, thereby "rushing up" to meet us at various points in life. This insight underscores the importance of learning from the past and integrating its lessons into our present actions.

"Love is a very peculiar thing; it doesn't behave as it should like anything else."

The quote suggests that love, unlike other emotional or physical phenomena, does not always follow predictable patterns or rules. It has an inherent unpredictability and unconventional nature, making it unique and challenging to comprehend or define. This peculiarity stems from its intimate connection with the complexities of human emotions, relationships, and experiences.

"We are all of us children of our time and place."

This quote by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala underscores the idea that individual identities, values, and perspectives are significantly shaped by the specific historical context and cultural environment in which we grow up. It emphasizes that our beliefs, behaviors, and worldview are deeply intertwined with the social, political, economic, and intellectual influences of our time and place. This insight highlights the importance of understanding and respecting diversity, as well as acknowledging that each person's unique experiences contribute to the richness and complexity of human society.

"I think there's something in a person that wants to hurt somebody, wants to destroy someone who has hurt them."

This quote suggests a deep-seated human impulse for retribution; when individuals experience harm or hurt, they may instinctively desire to inflict pain upon those who caused it as a means of emotional healing or self-defense. It's important to remember that this sentiment should not be taken as an endorsement for vengeance but rather as an observation of human nature, acknowledging our tendency towards revenge and the complex emotions associated with hurt and conflict.

"The idea is not to live forever, but to create something that will."

This quote emphasizes the importance of creating and leaving a lasting impact over achieving eternal life. It suggests that while longevity is beyond human control, the ability to produce meaningful work or contributions that outlive us provides a sense of immortality. The implication is that our true purpose in life might not be to live forever but to shape and enrich the world through our creations.

England gave me a language and literature, the basis of what I am as a writer, but when I started writing more directly about my own experience, it wasn't England so much as what went before.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Own, Before, About, Directly

Film, for me, is in two stages. One is when I write the script more or less on my own - that's the nice bit. And then comes for me the unpleasant bit when they all go off, 100 people - actors and camera people and film and sound - and I stay away. When they go into the editing room, I come in again, and that's the bit I like.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Away, I Write, Unpleasant, Stages

Once a refugee, always a refugee. I can't ever remember not being all right wherever I was, but you don't give your whole allegiance to a place or want to be entirely identified with the society you're living in.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Living, Give, Always, Identified

It's technically extremely difficult to get down what you really mean, not what you think you mean, or what you think sounds good, but what's really there, what you really have to express, in words that somehow convey that meaning in an approximate way.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Words, Think, Difficult, Approximate

England opened up the world of literature for me. Not really having a world of my own, I made up for my disinheritance by absorbing the world of others... I loved them: George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Charles Dickens... I adopted them passionately.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Own, Hardy, Charles, Dickens

I'm not interested in who am I. I'm interested in what's gone, the disinheritance, what I've been able to become or learn or fuse with or not fuse with. A certain freedom comes... I like it that way.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Learn, Like, Been, Who Am I

All my early books are written as if I were Indian. In England, I had started writing as if I were English; now I write as if I were American. You take other people's backgrounds and characters; Keats called it negative capability.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Other, I Write, Had, Indian

The older books were quite light-hearted. But I think most of my novels do end on a deep note of pessimism. Shadows seem to be closing in. The final conclusion isn't that life is wonderful and everything is bright and cheery and in the garden.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Deep, Pessimism, Note, Novels

I was never interested in film. Never. I never even thought of it. I wasn't even a film buff, I didn't see many films ever.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Thought, Film, Films, Buff

Film is not like a book; it's not a writer's baby at all. So many people have put in their talent, by that time that you feel grateful for what they've done, you don't feel possessive about it in any way.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Book, Feel, About, Possessive

I only really woke up in India. It was my first experience of plenty, strangely enough, because everything in England was rationed. I loved sweets, but you couldn't get them; then there was this marvelous mitthai - I went crazy.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Experience, India, Woke, Strangely

I always find the first thing that really bothers me when I start a screenplay is, I have to find a different form. You can't follow the form of the novel. It's a different thing completely. It's impossible. You just somehow have to find a structure for the whole thing. You have to crack that.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Impossible, Whole, Crack

India was a sensation. It was remarkable to see all those parrots flying about, the brilliant foliage and the brilliant sky. It was a tremendous pageant. I never noticed the poverty.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Sky, Brilliant, Noticed, Pageant

I am a central European with an English education and a deplorable tendency to constant self-analysis. I am irritable and have weak nerves.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Education, Constant, Deplorable

Everyone is so estranged; no one is rooted. That's what I like to write about more than anything else. Everything being so mixed up. Racially mixed up, people moving from place to place, everything shifting.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

About, Mixed, Anything Else, Rooted

Perhaps I'm just fickle by nature and get tired of countries the way other women do of husbands or lovers.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Nature, Other, Fickle, Husbands

I stand before you as a writer without any ground of being out of which to write: really blown about from country to country, culture to culture till I feel - till I am - nothing. As it happens, I like it that way.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Country, Before, Till, Blown

I never really had any close friends in India, and I felt a terrible loneliness and isolation for many years. Westernized Indians don't like my books and I tend not to like westernized Indians - so we're quits.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

India, Close Friends, Had, Indians

First, I was so dazzled and besotted by India. People said the poverty was biblical, and I'm afraid that was my attitude, too. It's terribly easy to get used to someone else's poverty if you're living a middle-class life in it. But after a while, I saw it wasn't possible to accept it, and I also didn't want to.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

India, Used, Terribly, Middle-Class

The misfortune to be born when I was, where I was. That was a piece of bad luck.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Luck, Bad, Piece, Misfortune

I like characters who are larger-than-life, whether life-loving women or the artist or guru who grabs everything. But I don't live among people like that.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Artist, Guru, Like, Characters

One doesn't choose to become a writer. One is just born that way.

- Ruth Prawer Jhabvala

Born, Choose, Just, Writer

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