The Mother - Maxim Gorky

This novel by Gorky looks through the eyes and thoughts of Pelagia Nilovna as she grows from a smashed woman, who is regularly abused by a drunk husband into a strong character that follows her son's intellectual and practical path of fighting for the rights of the working class - the true agent of change..

“Not even an ocean of blood can drown the truth”.

The book is about the concepts of  work, evolution, thought, education, rise against injustice, camaraderie, and rejection of a complete social order..

"Thousands of people can improve their life if they wanted to, but they continue to live like animals, and accept it too. What virtue is it to work and eat today, work and eat tomorrow, and so on for all life... Spent working and eating, so he can manage and have children to amuse him till they need food.. and then he becomes angry and starts cursing them: Grow you pigs, it is time for you to find jobs. He wants to make them his pets, but they start working for their own bellies, spending their lives as a piece of gum... with no pleasure to the heart or the soul"

"Deserving the title of humanity are those who vow their selves and lives to destroy the chains that capture man's mind. "

"She loved to listen to his talks, and used to imagine that the fiercest enemies of the people are those who trick and savagely oppress them. They are short men, with fat bodies, red faces, thieves, cruel, evil and greedy.If the ruler pushed them too far, they encouraged the people to revolt, and when the ruler is gone, these little men used their smart tricks to hog the power and throw away the people, killing hundreds of thousands if they try to resist."

"Nicolai greeted his sister holding her hand, and the mother was intrigued by that calm simplicity that ruled their relationship. They don't kiss, or over-show affection, and yet they care about each other with much compassion and love. Where she had lived people always kiss and praise, but they never cease biting each other like hungry hounds"


"They destroy lives with work. What for? They rob men of their lives. What for, I ask? My master--I lost my life in the textile mill of Nefidov--my master presented one prima donna with a golden wash basin. Every one of her toilet articles was gold. That basin holds my life-blood, my very life. That's for what my life went! A man killed me with work in order to comfort his mistress with my blood. He bought her a gold wash basin with my blood."
"Man is created in the image of God," said Yefim, smiling. "And that's the use to which they put the image. Fine!"

"Yes, a bit of happiness is good for everybody."
"But there are no people who want only a bit of happiness," remarked Nikolay; "and when there's much of it, it becomes cheap."

 "In one book I read the words 'senseless life.' I understood them very well at once. I know such a life. Thoughts there are, but they're not connected, and they stray like stupid sheep without a shepherd. They stray and stray, with no one to bring them together. There's no understanding in people of what must be done. That's what a senseless life is. I'd like to run away from it without even looking around--such a severe pang one suffers when one understands something!"

The Life of Pi - Yann Martel

The Life of Pi is a very interesting book, in which the story revolves around a kid lost at sea on a boat, with a hyena, orangutan, zebra, and tiger .. His very captivating adventure is described in very vivid and amazing detail, and in a brilliant manner which reminds us of the power of imagination and the cruelty of the real world, the mind's ability to create a complete world, sometimes more significant than the real world, and which even 'god would prefer.'

Pi is a boy of all religions, identifying how all are relevant to his life and close to his heart.

'I remember the story of our lord Krishna,when he used to invite the maids every night to dance with him in the forest.. They come and dance. The night is dark and as the fire between them glows, the girls would dance and dance with their beautiful god, who has made himself many to be able to dance with all of them. The second the girls become possessive, and when each imagines that Krishna is her partner alone,  he disappears! We should never be jealous with god'

'Christianity is a religion in a hurry. Look at the world created in seven days. Even on the symbolic level this is creation in a hurry. For someone who was born in a religion where the battle for one soul is a race that can take centuries where generations and generations are born, the fast happening of Christianity has a shocking effect. If Hinduism flows like the ganges, Christianity Moves quickly like Toronto in the rush hour. In a second, your soul is either lost or saved. Christianity goes back for centuries, but practically it exists in one time: now.'

' I prayed to Jesus who is alive and who is love and who is now. Then I ran down the hill to the left and climbed the hill to the right to thank the lord Krishna who made me meet Jesus' 

There are always those who take it upon themselves to defend god, as if the 'absolute truth' , as if the eternal frame of existence, was something weak and desperate always in need for their help. These people don't know that defending god is from the inside not the outside, or they would have directed their anger to themselves. The land of the main battle for good is in the little space inside every humans heart.. In the meanwhile widows and the homeless live under a hard destiny, and these people should defend them, not god. 

To me religion is about dignity not our corruption

People migrate because of worry, because of the horrible feeling that no matter how hard they work, they will not earn the rewards, and that what they build in a year, others can destroy in a day. 

Life is a little hole, a very little entry to the enormous universe.. How can I avoid looking through this looking glass? This little hole is all I have.