“They had failed to understand that there was no such thing as private life in wartime Germany. No amount of reticence could change the fact that every individual German belonged to the generality of Germans and must share in the general destiny of Germany, even as more and more bombs were falling on the just and unjust alike.”

“If my theory of relativity is proven successful, Germany will claim me as a German and France will declare me a citizen of the world. Should my theory prove untrue, France will say that I am a German, and Germany will declare that I am a Jew.”

“No class or group or party in Germany could escape its share of responsibility for the abandonment of the democratic Republic and the advent of Adolf Hitler. The cardinal error of the Germans who opposed Nazism was their failure to unite against it.”

“Italy: Germany, Germany. Germany is a really really nice place. Even though I'm your prisoner, you give me food, and it doesn't suck like English food. Sausages with cheeses always taste so good, it'd be heaven for a dog - yeah that's Germany. Tell me how is it you Germans are so robust? You're crushing me with your intimidation, my fragility causes me to openly weep out of fear, your women terrify me. Is it the norm to drink a barrel of beer and then bust it on somebody's head? Please don't come to my place in large mobs, German tourists are scary. Even the girls that are from Germany are more rugged than I am. Yahoo!”

“A German attack on Russia’s ally France would, in reality, be defensive—but the English talked as if Germany was trying to dominate Europe.”

“…no biography of his existed in German even though sales of his books were rising in Germany as well as the rest of Europe and even in the United States, which likes vanished writers (vanished writers or millionaire writers) or the legend of vanished writers…”