India always changes people, and I have been no exception Ruth Prawer Jhabvala More Quotes by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala More Quotes From Ruth Prawer Jhabvala 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 garden book thinking The misfortune to be born when I was, where I was. That was a piece of bad luck. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala born pieces luck 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 grateful baby book 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 peoples backgrounds and characters; Keats called it negative capability. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala writing character book I am dissatisfied with everything I have ever written and regard it all only as a preparation for that one work which probably I don't have it in me to write but which I hope I can go on trying for. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala preparation writing trying Westernized Indians don't like my books and I tend not to like westernized Indians - so we're quits. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala quitting book 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 who-am-i not-interested freedom way 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 camera me my-own people 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 place you society remember 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 i-am feel you culture 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 never poverty flying sky 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 english i-am weak education Perhaps I'm just fickle by nature and get tired of countries the way other women do of husbands or lovers. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala women tired nature way 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 i-am me experience language 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 loved you experience crazy 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 live women artist people 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 never thought see film 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 you attitude life people One doesn't choose to become a writer. One is just born that way. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala choose just born way 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 never friends india loneliness
