Hema felt she'd tricked time; with her twentieth-century knowledge she had travelled back to an earlier epoch

Yes, it might be the era of the kidney transplant in America and a vaccine for polio due to arrive even in India, but here [Ethiopia] Hema felt she'd tricked time; with her twentieth-century knowledge she had travelled back to an earlier epoch. The power filtered down from His Majesty to the Rases, the Dejazmaches, and the letter nobility, and then to the vassals and the peons. Her skills were so rare, so needed for the poorest of the poor, and even at times in the royal palace, that she felt valued. Wasn't that the definition of home? Not where you are from, but where you are wanted?

A. Verghese, Cutting for stone (2009), 79  

A man starved all his life will never rebel.

A man starved all his life will never rebel. Up north there was no rebellion. No one raised his voice or his hand there. But just let the subject start to eat his fill and then try to take the bowl away, and immediately he rises in rebellion. The usefulness of going hungry is that a hungry man thinks only of bread. He's all wrapped up in the thought of food. He loses the remains of his vitality in that thought, and he no longer has either the desire or the will to seek pleasure through the temptation of disobedience. Just think : Who destroyed our Empire? Who reduced it to ruin? Neither those who had too much, nor those who had nothing, but those who had a bit. Yes, one should always beware of those who have a bit, because they are the worst, they are the greediest, it is they who push upward.

R. Kapuściński, The Emperor (1978), tr. W.R. Brand and K.Mroczkowska-Brand (1983), 113

Germame took bribes and used them to build schools

So the dignitaries started their denunciations in monosyllables, hints, whispers, but then more and more boldly (even if still informally), delicately, dropping hints in conversational lulls - that Germame took bribes and used them to build schools. 

Now just imagine how worried these dignitaries must have been. After all, it was understandable that a governor accepted tributes; all the dignitaries accepted tributes. Power begat wealth, as it had since the beginning of the world. But the abnormality of it was this, that a governor should use these tributes to build schools. And the example at the top was a command to subordinates, which meant that all the dignitaries should give money for schools. Now just for a moment let us admit a base thought. Let us say that a second Germame springs up in a second province and starts to give away his bribes. Immediately we would have a mutiny of the dignitaries, protesting against this principle of giving away bribes. The result: the end of the Empire. A fine prospect-at first a few pennies, and finally the fall of the monarchy. 

R. Kapuściński, The Emperor (1978), tr. W.R. Brand and K.Mroczkowska-Brand (1983), 66

The King of Kings preferred bad ministers

I'll come right out and say it: the King of Kings preferred bad ministers. And the King of Kings preferred them because he liked to appear in a favorable light by contrast. How could he show himself favorably if he were surrounded by good ministers? The people would be disoriented. Where would they look for help? On whose wisdom and kindness would they depend? Everyone would have been good and wise. What disorder would have broken out in the Empire then! Instead of one sun, fifty would be shining, and everyone would pay homage to a privately chosen planet. No, my dear friend, you cannot expose the people to such disastrous freedom. There can be only one sun. Such is the order of nature, and anything else is a heresy. But you can be sure that His Majesty shined by contrast. How imposingly and kindly he shone, so that our people had no doubts about who was the sun and who the shadow.

R. Kapuściński, The Emperor (1978), tr. W.R. Brand and K.Mroczkowska-Brand (1983), 33-34