SUDHA MURTY

I was a very naughty kid, who'd say 'I'd write tomorrow.'

I find joy in giving donations.

With one or two children at home, I feel that parents concentrate too much on them and hence children lose touch with reality. They get whatever they desire and fail to understand that in real life you may or may not get what you wish for.

I am touched by my readers who loved my books. All the stories are true incidents in life. Now I have realised, any amount of imagination will not be as beautiful as the real life.

I like portraying women of character in my books. Women who exhibit loyalty and courage.

Women should realise their strength and set goals.

I started writing when I was in school. I wrote essays and in my teen years I used to write sorrowful sad stories and poems as you do at the age.

Frankly, there is not much demand from home and I don't socialise much - no partying, get-togethers and very rare wedding appearances.

Mythology is part of our heritage, part of our identity at times because anywhere in India you will find the name of Rama or Krishna in one or the other form.

I would arrive in college at 8:30 A. M. and go back home at noon to go to the toilet. Then I would return again.

I like to write and that's why I write. I don't think about how much the book will sell.

I feel my thoughts flow freely when I write in Kannada.

What I have to write, the story, it is always going on in my mind. What incidences I can add in the story - it is a continuous process.

If I give someone flowers, what will they really do with it. If I take food, the person could be diabetic... But books are a source of knowledge, I have great thirst for knowledge.

I happily watch movies made on the life and achievement of others.

When you are chiselling a sculpture, it won't happen in one day, it happens over a period of time. It's the same way that my personality has changed over the past 15 years. I am not the same person I used to be and my life experiences are what have made me.

To write, I think it is very important to read. The more you read, the more you know the techniques of writing.

Though most of my titles are translated into about 7 to 8 languages, I feel that translations, to some extent, can lose the flavour of the colloquial words used otherwise in the regional narrative.

I am a complete movie buff who still prefers to go for the late night show and seldom watch movies at home.

If you are determined in your life, it is only the mindset that counts which is more important than questions like if I can do or cannot do.

Professionally, my first book came out at the age of 29, where I wrote about my experiences of backpacking in U.S. on a frugal budget.

My ad-hoc empirical formula is that wherever you grow a lot of rice, there is a lot of art developing as well. My theory goes on to say that after having a nice meal of rice, one feels lethargic and don't think of work. When you don't think of work, you think of art.

My novels are always in Kannada because I express myself better in Kannada.

Education, leading to financial independence, has surely made women more empowered.

I will not buck to pressure of delivering to publishers.