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Freitag, 10. April 2015

Happy Birthday Stefan Heym!

Einer, auf den man blickt, hat kein Recht zu versagen.

A foreman in the East wouldn't know how many workers he would have the next day, because part of his working force had left the system to go to West Germany.

Frauen sind schlimmer als Ketten, sie verhindern, dass man über sich hinaus wächst.

A great number of people in the East German parts had been Nazis, so the change of mind was not altogether there.

Wer tut schon was vernünftig ist und naheliegend?

A Western writer came up to me and said, how come nobody at this demonstration spoke of German unity? I told him, because it isn't on the agenda. People were interested in having another, better GDR, another, better socialism.

Es hilft einem immer zu wissen, dass es jemanden gibt, der noch elender ist als man selbst.

And also, of course, I knew that the German people, they're one, and would tend to consider themselves as one; and therefore they would consider the Wall as an enforced imprisonment. And I was right in thinking that way.

Das Leben eines Sklaven mag keinen Wert mehr haben, aber in den Augen des Sklaven ist auch niemandes anderen Leben von Wert.

And of course, in West Germany, they made every effort that people who came from the East would get jobs and would get a comfortable existence. That was part of the Cold War - and part of the winning side of the Cold War.

Je primitiver der Mensch, desto vielfältiger sind seine Ängste.

And one of the worst effects was that by suppressing critical thought, it also suppressed critical thought in the field of economics and hampered the development of economics - and the country would fall back further and further in the economic competition with the West.

Was ist überhaupt Ruhm? Heutzutage bedeutete es nur, sich zusätzlichen Gefahren auszusetzen. Die große Kunst war, die Arbeit zu machen und trotzdem am Leben zu bleiben.

But if they started a military conflagration, it would automatically lead to nuclear warfare, because one side would be defeated in the beginning and then it would answer by atomic bombs.

Die immer die großen Reden halten, taugen nicht im Kampf.

Even in West Germany in the beginning, people wanted a kind of socialism.

In Fragen Krieg und Frieden muss man sich bekennen, nicht weil man ein Held sein möchte oder ein Märtyrer, sondern wegen des allmorgendlichen Blicks in den Rasierspiegel.

I always had the attitude: this Wall cannot be permanent. If it's permanent, it's permanent defeat.

Macht! Die Gewissheit, dass man ein Drahtzieher ist und nicht einer, der am Draht baumelt, dass man ein Treiber ist und kein Getriebener.

I believed this new form of social relationships and production could only succeed if you had freedom of initiative and speech and expression and criticism-which is what Marx demanded in the beginning.

Die Leute meinen, das siebente Jahr ist ein kritisches, denn bereits Moses, welcher uns geführt hat aus Ägypten sagt in seinem Buch, dass nach sieben Jahren soll aufhören deine Sklaverei und du sollst herauskommen aus deinen Ketten.

I certainly hoped that in the Eastern part of Germany, what was just beginning to be called the German Democratic Republic, you would develop a system of socialism with freedom and democracy.

Und sobald die Leute einmal die Erfahrung machen, dass der Terror sie vollkommen willkürlich trifft, verliert der Terror seine Wirkung, seinen Stachel.

I did not oppose unification, I knew unification would have to come, but not in the form in which it did come. There were two ways of doing it and they took it the radical way, the forceful way.

Es gehört zu den vielen Merkwürdigkeiten des Lebens, dass ein Mensch umso bissiger wird, je weniger Zähne er hat.

I ended the speech by saying that democracy was a Greek word and it meant ruled by the people.

Diskretion ist Wahrheit gezügelt durch Weisheit.

I knew the German people would consider themselves as one; and therefore they would consider the Wall as an enforced imprisonment. And I was right.

Leiden ist kein Verdienst; das Lamm, das sich fressen lässt, stärkt die Ordnung der Wölfe.

I not only saw the possibility of nuclear war, I feared it very much. Not that I thought that either side would be foolish enough to start with it.

Du kannst nicht abtreten, ohne dass Du Dein Werk vollständig vorgelegt hast.

I remember the tremendous applause I got and of course I also knew that a lot of secret police were standing around that truck from which we were speaking.

I was in psychological warfare in World War II, so I know psychological warfare when I see it.

In the question of peace, people spoke up and demonstrated for peace and against the threat of war, the threat of atomic war.

People knew what they could do and what they could not do, what they would not be permitted to do.

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