In the history of old Jewish literature there was never any basic difference between the poet and the prophet. Our ancient poetry often became law and a way of life.
The ghetto was not only a place of refuge for a persecuted minority but a great experiment in peace, in self-discipline and in humanism. As such it still exists and refuses to give up in spite of all the brutality that surrounds it. I was brought up among those people.
The genuine writer cannot ignore the fact that the family is losing its spiritual foundation.
Some of my cronies call me a pessimist and a decadent, but there is always a background of faith behind resignation.
If Moses had been paid newspaper rates for the Ten Commandments, he might have written the Two Thousand Commandments.
Shoulders are from God and burdens too.
The New England conscience doesn’t keep you from doing what you shouldn’t – it just keeps you from enjoying it.
The second half of the twentieth century is a complete flop.
The waste basket is the writer’s best friend.
There is great treasure there behind our skull and this is true about all of us. This little treasure has great, great powers, and I would say we only have learnt a very, very small part of what it can do.
In the half darkness I winked to my other self, my mad dictator, and congratulated him on his droll victory. I closed my eyes and felt the warmth flowing from Shosha’s head to my face. What did I have to lose? Nothing more than what everyone loses anyway.
We all play chess with Fate as partner. He makes a move, we make a move. He tries to checkmate us in three moves, we try to prevent it. We know we can’t win, but we’re driven to give him a good fight.
What happened was no accident. Everything was preordained. True, the will was free, but heaven also made its ordinances.
One can find in the Yiddish tongue and in the Yiddish spirit expressions of pious joy, lust for life, longing for the Messiah, patience and deep appreciation of human individuality.
It is a fact that the classics of Yiddish literature are also the classics of the modern Hebrew literature.
In our time, when the literature for adults is deteriorating, good books for children are the only hope, the only refuge.
God gave us so many emotions, and so many strong ones. Every human being, even if he is an idiot, is a millionaire in emotions.
The very essence of literature is the war between emotion and intellect, between life and death. When literature becomes too intellectual – when it begins to ignore the passions, the emotions – it becomes sterile, silly, and actually without substance.
The analysis of character is the highest human entertainment.
No doubt the world is entirely an imaginary world, but it is only once removed from the true world.