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We would only multiply the number of victims. Our duty is to strengthen the state and defend the people, why, then, should we publish your book.

— Vasily Grossman

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More quotes by Vasily Grossman

National Socialism had created a new type of political criminals: criminals who had not committed a crime.

Life and Fate (1959)

Our Soviet writer must be guided in his world only by the need of the people, useful for the society.

The more difficult a man's life had been before the camp, the more furiously he lied. This lie had no practical purpose; it served simply to glorify freedom. How could a man be unhappy outside the camp?

Life and Fate (1959)

It is impossible to publish your book, and it will not be published in the next 200 years.

We should not underestimate the harm it would bring should it be published.

All Vasily Grossman quotes →

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Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.

Francis Bacon Meditationes sacræ (1597)

It is not in the books of the Philosophers, but in the religious symbolism of the Ancients, that we must look for the footprints of Science, and re-discover the Mysteries of Knowledge.

Albert Pike Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry (1871)

There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches.

Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451 (1953)

People say that life is the thing, but I prefer reading.

Logan Pearsall Smith Afterthoughts (1931)

Attribution

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