We are all brothers and we are all suffering the same fate. The same smoke floats over all our heads. Help one another. It is the only way to survive. (pg. 39)

The darkness enveloped us. All I could hear was the violin and it was as if Juliek's soul had become the bow. He was playing his life...He played that which he would never play again.

All collective judgments are wrong. Only racists make them. No human race is superior; no religious faith is inferior.

If there is a single theme that dominates all my writings, all my obsessions, it is that of memory-because I fear forgetfulness as much as hatred and death.

For the dead and the living, we must bear witness. Not only are we responsible for the memories of the dead, we are responsible for what we do with those memories

My ambition really was, even as a child, to be a writer, a commentator, and a teacher, but a teacher of Talmud.

Oh, it is not death that frightens me, but the impossibility of imparting some meaning to my past.