Flights

by Olga Tokarczuk

Here we were taught that the world could be described, and even explained, by means of simple answers to intelligent questions. That in its essence the world was inert and dead, governed by fairly simple laws that needed to be explained and made public—if possible with the aid of diagrams.

if instead we simply saw the world as it was, with nothing to protect us, honestly and courageously, it would break our hearts.

A disposable instrument of cognition.

I believe, unswervingly, agonizingly, that it is in freaks that Being breaks through to the surface and reveals its true nature.

Evidently there was someone who recognized that these freaks of nature were owed immortality, and that only what is different will survive.

Islands spawn parsimony.

It is widely known, after all, that real life takes place in movement.

“But don’t let yourself be taken in by the diversity—it’s superficial,” she said. “It’s all smoke and mirrors. In reality, everywhere is the same. In terms of animals. In terms of how we interact with animals.”

I love the idea of reading books as a brotherly, sisterly moral obligation to one’s people.

Sometimes in the morning one even has the impression that this moment is close by, that today might be the day it will arrive.