“Když Tvůj přítel padne, nemáš se radovat, ale ani mu nemáš pomoct vstát.”

“Ali kamo idemo, ne znamo. Možda ćemo uspjeti preživjeti boleštine i umaknuti selekcijama, možda ćemo izdržati napor i glad koji nas rastaču: a onda? Ovdje, trenutačno daleko od psovki i batina, iznova se možemo vratiti sebi samima i meditirati, a tada postaje jesno da se nećemo vratiti. Mi smo putovali sve dovde u plombiranim vagonima! Vidjeli smo kako put ništavila odlaze naše žene i djeca; nakon što su od nas napravili robove, marširali smo sto puta tamo-amo zaludu, ugašene duše prije bezlične smrti. Nećemo se vratiti. Odavde nitko ne smije izaći, jer bi u svijet mogao ponijeti, zajedno sa znakom utisnutim u tijelo, opaku vijest o tome koliko čovjeku treba hrabrosti, u Auschwitzu, da bude čovjek.”

“Válka, to je hlavně velký zmatek, na poli i v lidských hlavách: často člověk ani nechápe, kdo vlastně vítězí a kdo prohrává, o tom pak rozhodnou generálové a ti, co píšou dějepisné knihy.”

“Logic and morality made it impossible to accept an illogical and immoral reality; they engendered a rejection of reality which as a rule led the cultivated man rapidly to despair. But the varieties of the man-animal are innumerable, and I saw and have described men of refined culture, especially if young, throw all this overboard, simplify and barbarize themselves, and survive. A simple man, accustomed not to ask questions of himself, was beyond the reach of the useless torment of asking himself why.The harsher the oppression, the more widespread among the oppressed is the willingness, with all its infinite nuances and motivations, to collaborate: terror, ideological seduction, servile imitation of the victor, myopic desire for any power whatsoever… Certainly, the greatest responsibility lies with the system, the very structure of the totalitarian state; the concurrent guilt on the part of individual big and small collaborators is always difficult to evaluate… they are the vectors and instruments of the system’s guilt… the room for choices (especially moral choices) was reduced to zero”

“Dawn came on us like a betrayer; it seemed as though the new sun rose as an ally of our enemies to assist in our destruction.”

“Our ignorance allowed us to live, as you are in the mountains, and your rope is frayed and about to break, but you don't know it and feel safe.”

“The librarian, whom I had never seen before, presided over the library like a watchdog, one of those poor dogs who are deliberately made vicious by being chained up and given little to eat; ot better, like the old, toothless cobra, pale because of centuries of darkness, who guards the king's treasure in the Jungle Book. Paglietta, poor woman, was little less than a lusus naturae: she was small, without breasts or hips, waxen, wilted, and monstrously myopic; she wore glasses so thick and concave that, looking at her head-on, her eyes, light blue, almost white, seemed very far away, stuck at the back of her cranium. She gave the impression of never having been young, although she was certainly not more than thirty, and of having been born there, in the shadows, in that vague odor of mildew and stale air.”