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By way of that wretched sentence "Auschwitz cannot be explained" is the wretched author explaining that we should be silent concerning Auschwitz, that Auschwitz doesn’t exist, or, rather, that it didn’t, for the only facts that cannot be explained are those that don’t or didn’t exist.

— Imre Kertész Kaddish for a Child Not Born (1990)

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More quotes by Imre Kertész

Talking is not enough; words don’t clarify anything. I’ll have to hit upon something, but what?

Detective Story (2008)

On the other hand, what is really irrational and what truly cannot be explained is not evil but, contrarily, the good.

Kaddish for a Child Not Born (1990)

If people had understood the greatness of those works, they would have destroyed them long ago.

Liquidation (2003)

I exist. Is this a life still? No, just vegetating. It seems that only one philosophy can succeed the philosophy of existentialism: nonexistentialism, the philosophy of nonexistent existence.

Detective Story (2008)

Of course, living is another way of killing oneself: its drawback is that it takes so horribly long.

Detective Story (2008)

All Imre Kertész quotes →

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Imre Kertész (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.