The idea of a socialism with a human face was something that I absolutely could support, because it was my idea from the very first.

In the question of peace, people spoke up and demonstrated for peace and against the threat of war, the threat of atomic war.

You had censorship. If you brought a manuscript to the publisher, you knew he would suggest changes. If you wanted to write and speak what you thought had to be written and spoken, you had to act against all these suppressive rules.

The Wall was the actual symbol of a defeat, of inferiority.

People in the East looked toward the West with longing. They would have liked to have the same comforts, the same goods, the same chances. They saw a system that demanded of them sacrifices with nothing but promises for the future.

A Western writer came up to me and said, how come nobody at this demonstration spoke of German unity? I told him, because it isn't on the agenda. People were interested in having another, better GDR, another, better socialism.

Even in West Germany in the beginning, people wanted a kind of socialism.