It may well be that our means are fairly limited and our possibilities restricted when it comes to applying pressure on our government But is this a reason to do nothing? Despair is nor an answer Neither is resignation Resignation only leads to indifference, which is not merely a sin but a punishment.

I listen to music when I write. I need the musical background. Classical music. I'm behind the times. I'm still with Baroque music, Gregorian chant, the requiems, and with the quartets of Beethoven and Brahms. That is what I need for the climate, for the surroundings, for the landscape: the music.

I developed an anger at [Moses] Mendelssohn. Later, I read the book. I realized there was nothing subversive in it.

We must choose between the violence of adults and the smiles of children. Between the ugliness of hate and the will to oppose it. Between inflicting suffering and humiliation on our fellow man and offering him the solidarity and hope he deserves.

[Chinese] are a huge empire now, you'll soon be - in a few years two billion people in the world. So, you should be more compassionate, more understanding. And above all, you don't need all their trouble.

You take a text, you explore it, you enter it with all your heart and all your mind.

Sometimes I think I prefer the storyteller in [Roman Vishniac] to the photographer. But aren't they one and the same?