“Funny how a beautiful song could tell such an ugly story.”
“There are stories to tell that are not songs.”
“You have a choice in this world, I believe, about how to tell sad stories, and we made the funny choice.”
“The potential beauty of human life is constantly made ugly by man's ever-recurring song of retaliation.”
“But how could you live and have no story to tell?”
“I wanted to tell the book thief many things, about beauty and brutality. But what could I tell her about those things that she didn't already know? I wanted to explain that I am constantly overestimating and underestimating the human race-that rarely do I ever simply estimate it. I wanted to ask her how the same thing could be so ugly and so glorious, and its words and stories so damning and brilliant.”