I did not volunteer for the Waffen SS, but was, as were thousands of my year group, conscripted. I did not then know as a 17-year-old that it was a criminal unit. I thought it was an elite unit. — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
I catch myself judging myself as that 13-year-old boy, who, of course, rightfully points out that he is only a child. And my membership - well, I was drafted into the Waffen-SS and didn't exactly volunteer, which was just as… — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
Melancholy has ceased to be an individual phenomenon, an exception. It has become the class privilege of the wage earner, a mass state of… — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
If work and leisure are soon to be subordinated to this one utopian principle - absolute busyness - then utopia and melancholy will come… — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
I have often supported Israel, I have often visited the country and want the country to exist and at last find peace with its… — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
Whenever there has been talk of exterminating rats, others, who were not rats, have been exterminated. — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
“You can begin a story in the middle and create confusion by striking out boldly, backward and forward. You can be modern, put aside… — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
There must be reasons why we men are so hipped on breasts as if we'd all been weaned too soon. — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
Often I had to imagine the things I needed. I learned very early to read amidst noise. And so I started writing and drawing… — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
What does a river like the Vistula carry away with it? Everything that goes to pieces: wood, glass, pencils, pacts ... chairs, bones, and… — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
Love That’s it: The cashless commerce. The blanket always too short. The loose connexion. To search behind the horizon. To brush fallen leaves with… — Gunter Grass Copy Share Image
“They had tried doing it by themselves in her room with a cheap onion, but it wasn't the same. You needed an audience. It… — Günter Grass Copy Share Image
