I cannot recall my neighbors without bursting into laughter mixed with tears. In those days men were not cast by the dozen in the same mold. Each was a separate world with his own peculiarities. He laughed differently from his neighbor, talked differently. Shutting himself up in his house, he kept his most secret desires hidden out of shame or fear, and these desires luxuriated within and strangled him. But he said nothing, and his life took on a tragic seriousness. In addition there was poverty, and as if this were not enough, the pride which demanded that no one discover this poverty. People
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