Thousands of people are being buried and no one attends the funerals,' said one of the soldiers. 'In peacetime it's the other way round: one coffin and a hundred people carrying flowers.
Vasily GrossmanIn the cruel and terrible time in which our generation has been condemned to live on this earth, we must never make peace with evil. We must never become indifferent to others or undemanding of ourselves.
Vasily GrossmanThere is a deep and undeniable sadness in all this: whenever we see the dawn of an eternal good that will never be overcome by evil โ an evil that is itself eternal but will never succeed in overcoming good โ whenever we see this dawn, the blood of old people and children is always shed.
Vasily GrossmanHuman groupings have one main purpose: to assert everyoneโs right to be different, to be special, to think, feel and live in his or her own way. People join together in order to win or defend this right. But this is where a terrible, fateful error is born: the belief that these groupings in the name of a race, a God, a party or a State are the very purpose of life and not simply a means to an end. No! The only true and lasting meaning of the struggle for life lies in the individual, in his modest peculiarities and in his right to these peculiarities.
Vasily Grossman