Literature seemed to be everything then. People looked to it for the strength to live, for guidance, for revelation.

In Poland a man must be one thing: white or black, here or there, with us or against us -- clearly, openly, without hesitations. . . . We lack the liberal, democratic tradition rich in all its gradations. We have instead the tradition of struggle: the extreme situation, the final gesture.

When is a crisis reached? When questions arise that can't be answered.

My writing is a combination of three elements. The first is travel: not travel like a tourist, but travel as exploration. The second is reading literature on the subject. The third is reflection.

Money changes all the iron rules into rubber bands.

First you destroy those who create values. Then you destroy those who know what the values are, and who also know that those destroyed before were in fact the creators of values. But real barbarism begins when no one can any longer judge or know that what he does is barbaric.

Literature seemed to be everything then. People looked to it for the strength to live, for guidance, for revelation.