Cultural Heritage Quotes

“The street outside is empty, lit only by a half moon; yet factory engines beat in the background and the working day is about to begin. Maggie steps out of the tenement and suddenly the street begins to fill with women, some running, some pulling their jackets around them, some lighting pipes, some, like Maggie herself, taking a pinch of snuff. From other tenements come other women, and soon all merge into one, like a herd of cattle off to market, clopping over the stone pavements and the cobbles, lowing with last night’s news.”
― Michael Tobert, Karna's Wheel

“We must not look past the maneuvers of politicians who feel driven by intuition fed by visionary hysteria. They pretend to have a 'privileged' mission to shoulder but rob people's physical or mental property, appropriating their cultural heritage. If their intuition is cautioned as vicious or murderous by reason or facts, history will forever eradicate their soul from the holy grail of humanity, especially those who want to set the world on fire for their sole ambition. ("What after bowling alone?" )”
― Erik Pevernagie

“When people enjoy problem-solving as a means of self-validation and accomplishment, we must be watchful. What if they frantically construct situations to concoct solutions for problems they like to create? What if their solutions appear to make conditions worse than before? The white knights of the world improvers, who don’t hesitate to destroy nature and cultural heritages, can be a threatening problem on their own when they deteriorate the quality of our lifestyle and environment. ("Why step out of nature" ?)”
― Erik Pevernagie

“Thatched huts of mud sit humped in rows. Between the rows, a stagnant stream of sewage stews like thick soup bubbling in the clotted heat. Mosquitoes swarm. Garbage rots. Parvati gathers her sari about her and steps as lightly as she can down this gutter of filth. The boy stops outside one of the huts. Parvati and Sunil push aside the sacking that is over the doorway, stoop and step down onto a mud floor. Inside, there is no window, no light and no air. Only heat. Parvati puts her hand to her long elegant throat. Above her, one end of the roof is sagging as if about to collapse.
‘Bustee, very good,’ says the boy smiling.”
― Michael Tobert, Karna's Wheel

“This is the tale of Magic Alex, the man who was everywhere: with Leonard Cohen in Hydra; in Crete with Joni Mitchell; in a Paris bathroom when Jimmy Morrison went down; working as a roadie setting up the Beatles last rooftop gig; an assistant to John and Yoko when they had a bed-in at the Amsterdam Hilton; with the Stones when they were charged for pissing against a wall; the first to find and save Dylan after the motorcycle accident; having it off with Mama Cass hours before she choked the big one; arranging the security at Altamont; at Haight-Ashbury with George Harrison and the Grateful Dead; and in the Japanese airport with McCartney after the dope rap. He was the guy Carly Simon was really singing about and the missing slice of ‘Bye, Bye Miss American Pie’.”
― Harry F. MacDonald, Magic Alex and the Secret History of Rock and Roll

“Julia, hanging back, says, ‘How have you been, Stephen?’
I want to tell her everything. I want to find out what she’s been doing, what she plans to do but, at this fated moment, a vision of my stomach floats before me. It is a soggy marsh, green rushes growing round the edges, gas bubbles surfacing all over and bursting. The bubbling of the marsh is set to the music of creation, the percussive glottal stops of the Big Bang. I realize I have, at best, one complete sentence left in me. ‘Julia,’ I begin, composing in my head a deranged paean of love that I can never utter. ‘I regret that I am not myself today. Terry has poisoned me.’
‘You should go home,’ she says.”
― Michael Tobert, Karna's Wheel

“You know what they say: Better one true friend than a hundred relatives.”
― Gina Buonaguro, The Virgins of Venice

“Venetians prefer being merchants to philosophers.”
― Gina Buonaguro, The Virgins of Venice

“Now you might remember the professor on the television show Gilligan’s Island. A really smart guy. He powered the island, developed a coconut clock, installed a plumbing and water system. He just never got around to fixing the boat. Brian was effective in just the same way.”
― Harry F. MacDonald, Magic Alex and the Secret History of Rock and Roll

“Elvis wasn’t always the over-weight and over-tasseled being you might have seen when he was way past his prime. Las Vegas always had a thing for the seedy and the needy.”
― Harry F. MacDonald, Magic Alex and the Secret History of Rock and Roll

“The only people who'll ever figure out who they are, are those who don't know who they are - whereas those who have already accepted their ancestral heritage as their ultimate identity, have no identity to begin with - they are just lifeless photocopies of the past, nothing else.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Divane Dynamite: Only truth in the cosmos is love

“When culture is code for division,
You gotta be uncultured to find assimilation.
When hagiographies are passed on as heritage,
To be heretic is the first course of action.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yarasistan: My Wounds, My Crown

“For animals culture and country may come first, as humans the whole world must be our priority.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Centurion Sermon: Mental Por El Mundo

“Not just being proud of Cultural Heritage, a leader carries it.”
― Vikrmn: CA Vikram Verma, Modified Leadership

“Culture integrated is culture empowered.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Amantes Assemble: 100 Sonnets of Servant Sultans

“Every atom of planet earth is teeming with potential, yet most see nothing beyond the rim of their culture.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Amantes Assemble: 100 Sonnets of Servant Sultans

“You don't have to support the state to love the culture.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Aşk Mafia: Armor of The World

“Culture transcends state.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Aşk Mafia: Armor of The World

“States rise, states fall,
but cultures are everlasting.
Isms arrive, isms wither,
but human spirit is evergreen.

You don't have to support
the state to love the culture.
You may be deemed enemy of the state,
and still be a hero of the culture.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Aşk Mafia: Armor of The World

“States rise, states fall, but cultures are everlasting.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Aşk Mafia: Armor of The World

“Heroes of culture are often branded as enemy of the state.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Aşk Mafia: Armor of The World

“So far, heritage has only caused a mess. You know why? Because it is never about just heritage - all talk of heritage inadvertently leads us to the savage dilemma of "our heritage versus their heritage". And such dilemma might have been acceptable in a savage society, but it is totally and utterly out of place in a civilized world.

So, either the very construct of heritage evolves, or becomes an impediment to the expansion, hence the welfare, of the world as well as the self.

That is why I say - just because you are born and raised in a particular culture, it doesn't mean, you are supposed to stay chained to that culture all your life, with blinkers on your eyes, that keep you ignorant of the beauty beyond the horizon.

Let me put this into perspective with an unambiguous example.

Some of you have asked me, what's my relation to Turkey? Well, everybody loves Rumi, but I learnt his tongue, so I could pick up where he left off.

Some of you have asked me, what's my relation to Latin America? Well, everybody loves to yell "viva la libertad", but I learnt el idioma, so I could revolutionize the very paradigm of revolution.

Every corner of earth has some distinct strongholds, and I am the force that brings them together to create a strong, sapient, and undivided planet.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Himalayan Sonneteer: 100 Sonnets of Unsubmission

“The falling populations of all Britain's wildlife, due in no small part to the disappearance and degradation of native habitats, are evidence that, despite their ties to our cultural heritage, the natural heritage of these lands is being allowed to collapse. In the words of the law, 'the creatures and habitats that belong to all' are being allowed to vanish.”
― Ben Jacob, The Orchid Outlaw: On a Mission to Save Britain's Rarest Flowers

“Heritage, in moderation, is an aid to growth, unmoderated, poison.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Rowdy Scientist: Handbook of Humanitarian Science

“Never confuse culture with state. Some of the richest cultures of the world often end up with some of the most regressive states in the world - Türkiye, Azerbaijan, India, Italy to name a few, in the context of 2023.

So I repeat, never let your disapproval of a government make you bitter towards a culture. Government never reflects culture - if it did, I would not have penned a single Turkish word in my works - as opposed to the fact that, the Turkish culture is an intrinsic element of Naskarean literature.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“My bonding with my colleagues and friends in Nepal is stronger than my bonding with some of my relatives in India.”
― Avijeet Das

“Tradition divides, tradition unites;
Choose carefully the tradition you live.
Not all traditions imposed on you are good,
You gotta use conscience to pick and mix.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Dervis Vadisi: 100 Promissory Sonnets

“Superstition mustn't be forwarded as culture.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yüz Şiirlerin Yüzüğü (Ring of 100 Poems, Bilingual Edition): 100 Turkish Poems with Translations

“Contaminate not the sweetness of soul,
with foul stench of segregated psyche.
Better stand civilized, without roots,
than be sentenced to inherited slavery.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Yüz Şiirlerin Yüzüğü (Ring of 100 Poems, Bilingual Edition): 100 Turkish Poems with Translations

“Black women's history is a tale of fierce determination, sass, and unyielding resilience. From Sojourner Truth's "Ain't I a Woman?" speech to Maya Angelou's poetic prowess, they've left a trail of fabulousness in their wake. With style, grace they've faced adversity head-on and emerged as queens of their own narratives. So let's raise a glass this February to the trailblazers, the game-changers, and the unsung heroes!”
― Life is Positive