"Those Germans who had suffered as political prisoners in Hitler's concentration camps never enjoyed the confidence of the Soviet occupation authorities. It was as if their very presence in Nazi Germany had tarnished them in Soviet eyes."
"A moaning by the walls half muffled: The mother's wounded, still alive. The little daughter's on the mattress, Dead. How many have been on it A platoon, a company perhaps? A girl's been turned into a woman, A woman turned into a corpse. It's all come down to simple phrases: Do not forget! Do not for"
"Nevertheless, the most harrowing element of the file is a series of frequent, almost daily reports filed by someone very close to Supka. Although not named in the police file, this informer must have been a close friend or personal secretary, for his knowledge of Supka’s movements, conversations, an"
"Even before they banned independent political parties for adults, and even before they outlawed church organizations and independent trade unions, they put young people's organizations under the strictest possible observation and restraint."
"The harsher policies imposed upon the Eastern bloc in 1947 and 1948 were therefore not merely, and certainly not only, a reaction to the Cold War. They were also a reaction to failure."
"The war ended the way a passage through a tunnel ends ... From far away you could see the light ahead, a gleam that kept growing, and its brilliance seemed ever more dazzling to you huddled there in the dark the longer it took to reach it. But when at last the train burst out in the glorious sunshin"
"Stalin was desperate to reach the city before the other Allies got there. His commanders understood this, and so did their American counterparts. General Eisenhower, knowing full well that the Germans would fight to the death in Berlin, wanted to save American lives and decided to let Stalin take th"
"The mentality of a refugee, forcibly expelled from his home, is not that of an emigrant who leaves to seek his fortune: his very circumstances fostered dependency and a sense of helplessness he might never have known before."
这浓浓的既视感。读着读着好似在看1984,又像在看中国现代史。"Human beings do not acquire totalitarian personalities with such ease. Even when it seems as if they are in full agreement with the most absurd propaganda-even if they are marching in parades, chanting slogans,singing that the party is always right - the spell can suddenly, unexpectedly, dramatically be broken."