Another Beauty Quotes

“I can’t write Krakow’s history, even though its people and ideas, trees and walls, cowardice and courage, freedom and rain all involve me. Ideas as well, since they cling to our skin and change us imperceptibly. The Zeitgeist chisels our thoughts and mocks our dreams. I’m intrigued by all kinds of walls; the space we inhabit isn’t neutral, it shapes our existence. Landscapes enter our innermost being, they leave traces not just on our retinas but on the deepest strata of our personalities. Those moments when the sky’s blue-gray suddenly stands revealed after a downpour stay with us, as do moments of quiet snowfall. And ideas may even join forces with the snow, through our senses and our body. They cling to the walls of houses. And later the houses and bodies, the senses and ideas all vanish. But I can’t write Krakow’s history, I can only try to reclaim a few moments, a few places and events; a few people I liked and admired, and a few that I despised.”
― Adam Zagajewski, Another Beauty

“I could write a guidebook about this city, this fallen city. Street by street, house by house, church by church. What happened in this building, who was betrayed, and by whom, in this apartment, who waited for whom on this street corner. And why the person never came.”
― Adam Zagajewski, Another Beauty

“Here are people who refused to cheat, who eagerly sought out the truth and shrank from neither poetry nor terror, the two poles of our globe - since poetry does exist in the world, in certain events, at rare moments. And there’s also no shortage of terror.”
― Adam Zagajewski, Another Beauty

“In the gray Poland plundered by the Soviet utopia there was no shortage of cunning petty demons on the party payroll out searching for young souls with ballistic tendencies, souls who dreamed of greatness and despised the trifling daily round of worries and pursuits.”
― Adam Zagajewski, Another Beauty