In der Fabrik hing oben am Giebel, der am höchsten in den…

“And I’m different without you. You’re the only one who thinks you’re never different.”

— Herta Müller

Working with language requires beauty for me.

— Herta Muller

“I wanted to work out a trade with things that aren’t alive but aren’t dead either. I wanted to make an emergency exchange, trading…

— Herta Müller

My first book, 'Nadirs,' was very important for me. I'll leave its literary worth for others to judge. But its publication in Berlin in…

— Herta Muller

“I'm drawn outside to the empty yard of the afternoon. The wind tosses thin snow that crackles against my neck. With open hunger the…

— Herta Müller

“The cabbage white flies through the tailor's cheek. The tailor sinks his head. The cabbage white flies out of the back of the tailor's…

— Herta Müller

“The reasaon I'm shy of objects is because I like them. I transfer the thoughts that are against me onto them. Then these thoughts…

— Herta Müller

“The gym instructor was the first to raise his hand. All the other hands flew up after his. While raising their hands, everybody looked…

— Herta Müller

I have packed myself into silence so deeply and for so long that I can never unpack myself using words. When I speak, I…

— Herta Muller

I never wanted to be a writer.

— Herta Muller

To combat death you don't need much of a life, just one that isn't yet finished.

— Herta Muller

Some people speak and sing and walk and sit and sleep and silence their homesickness, for a long time, and to no avail. Some…

— Herta Muller

“I wanted love to grow back, like the grass when it’s mown down. To grow differently, if need be, like children’s teeth, like hair,…

— Herta Müller

Whatever I read went under my skin. I almost devoured the literature, which became like a road to discovery.

— Herta Muller

“Some say that over time homesickness loses its specific content, that it starts to smolder and only then becomes all-consuming, because it’s no longer…

— Herta Müller