Novelists From Afghanistan

"Mariam: I can't believe what you are now, if you were a Benz before."

"Laila: A jeep? Maybe a jumbo jet?"

"Nana (to Mariam): When I'm gone, you'll have nothing in this world. You are nothing!"

"Nana (to Mariam) : A man's heart isn't like a woman's womb, Mariam! It won't bleed, it won't make room for you. A man's heart is a wretched, wretched thing. I'm all you have in this world, Mariam and when I'm gone, you'll have nothing. You are nothing!"

"Laila (at fourteen years): What would your mother say when she saw you smoke?"

"Tariq: She doesn't know"

"Laila: That could change"

"Tariq: Who's going to tell her? You?"

"Laila: Tell your secrets to the wind but don't blame it for telling the trees."

"Tariq: I do it for the girls"

"Laila: What girls?"

"Tariq: They think its sexy"

"Giti: Nobody ever came for my hand."

"Hasina: That's because you have a beard, my dear."

"Tariq (meeting Laila after ten years): It's good to see you, Laila."

"Mullah Faizullah: It wasn't your fault,Mariam. Don't think this way. This will destroy you, my girl. It wasn't your fault."

"Laila: It isn't fair."

"Mariam: No, it is fair. I killed our husband, Laila. I deprived your son of a father. Even if we escape, I...I won't be able to look at him without shame. No, it's my fault. Take care, Laila jo."

"Tariq: For you, Laila, I'd go all over the world"

"Mariam is never very far, she is here, in these walls they've repainted, in the trees they've planted, in the blankets that keep the children warm, in these pillows and books and pencils. She is in the children's laughter. She is in the verses Aziza recites and in the prayers she mutters when she bows westward. But, mostly, Miriam is in Laila's own heart, where she shines with the bursting radiance of a thousand suns."

"It wasn't easy tolerating him talking this way to her, to bear his scorn, his ridicule, his insults, his walking past her like she was nothing but a house cat. But after four years of marriage, Mariam saw clearly how much a woman could tolerate when she was afraid. And Mariam was afraid."

"And that, my young friends, is the story of our country, one invader after another. Macedonians. Sassanians. Arabs. Mongols. Now the Soviets. But we're like those walls up there. Battered, and nothing pretty to look at, but still standing."

"Maybe it was senseless to want to be near a person so badly here in a country where bullets had shredded her own brothers to pieces. But all Laila had to do was picture Tariq going at Khadim with his leg and then nothing in the world seemed more sensible to her."

"It always falls on the sober to pay for the sins of the drunk."

"The Chinese say it is better to be deprived of food for three days than tea for one."

"It does not frighten me to leave this life that my only son left five years ago, this life that insists we bear sorrow upon sorrow long after we can bear no more. No, I believe I shall gladly take my leave when the time comes. What frightens me, hamshira, is the day God summons me before him and asks, Why did you not do as I said, Mullah? Why did you not obey my laws? How shall I explain myself to him, hamshira? What will be my defense for not heeding His commands? All I can do, all any of us can do, in the time we are granted, is to go on abiding by the laws He has set for us. The clearer I see my end, hamsira, the nearer I am to my day of reckoning, the more determined I grow to carry out His word. However painful it may prove."

"I am tired and I am dying, and I want to be merciful. I want to forgive you. But when God summons me and says, But it wasn't for you to forgive, Mullah, what shall I say?"

"She was leaving the world as woman who had loved and been loved back. She was leaving it as a friend, a companion, a guardian. A mother. A person of consequence at last. No. It was not so bad, Mariam thought, that she should die this way. Not so bad."

"Every Afghan story is marked by death and loss and unimaginable grief. And yet, she sees, people find a way to survive, to go on."

"Beauty is an enormous, unmerited gift given randomly, stupidly."