‘Calcutta has still not recovered from history: people mourn the past, and abhor it deeply.’ — Amit Chaudhuri

‘This is a little parable about cities and genres; how, while some of them lose their imaginative centrality, others take their place.’

‘The myth of the Pujas is a simple one – full of rural sweetness. ... The Pujas are, in part, an ever-returning homage to that magical sense of being rescued, so indispensable to children.’

‘All foreign food is doomed to be consumed in India not so much by Indians as by a voracious Indian sensibility, which demands infinite versions of Indian food, and is unmoved by difference.’