Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead

by Olga Tokarczuk

many men come down with testosterone autism, the symptoms of which are a gradual decline in social intelligence and capacity for interpersonal communication, as well as a reduced ability to formulate thoughts. The Person beset by this Ailment becomes taciturn and appears to be lost in contemplation. He develops an interest in various Tools and machinery, and he’s drawn to the Second World War and the biographies of famous people, mainly politicians and villains. His capacity to read novels almost entirely vanishes; testosterone autism disturbs the character’s psychological understanding.

Fancy being given a body and not knowing anything about it. There’s no instruction manual.

As it says in Blake: ‘Opposition is true friendship.’

People have a duty towards Animals to lead them – in successive lives – to Liberation.

Here I must add my own comment, that intellectual limitation and human cruelty know no bounds.

‘We have a view of the world, but Animals have a sense of the world, do you see?’

‘Why are you crying?’ I asked. ‘You’re so kind…’ ‘I know,’ I replied. ‘What about you? Why are you crying?’ he said. That I didn’t know.