Tahir Shah Quotes

During the days I felt myself slipping into a kind of madness. Solitary confinement has an astonishing effect on the mind. The trip was to stay calm and keep myself occupied. I spent hours working out how to break free. But trying to escape would have been instant suicide.

Explorers like to pretend that they are a select breed of people with iron nerve and an ability to endure terrible hardship.

My father looked on in disbelief, overwhelmed that his son had been taught to eat glass and relish it.

Because there is no challenge, there is no reason to work hard. And with no reason to work hard, we all have become lazy. Lazy people are like cancer. They spread. Before you know it, the entire country is destroyed.

Respect was one thing. Survival was another. It was important that I kept my priorities in the right order.

Stories are a communal currency of humanity.

My father never told us how the stories worked. He didn't reveal the layers, the nuggets of information, the fragments of truth and fantasy. He didn't need to -- because, given the right conditions, the stories activated, sowing themselves.

In India everything has a use and a value.