Primo Levi Quotes

58 quotes in 1179 categories

• There is Auschwitz, and so there cannot be God.
• Anyone who has obeyed nature by transmitting a piece of gossip experiences the explosive relief that accompanies the satisfying of a primary need.
• Imagine now a man who is deprived of everyone he loves, and at the same time of his house, his habits, his clothes, in short,…
• To accuse another of having weak kidneys, lungs, or heart, is not a crime; on the contrary, saying he has a weak brain is a…
• The bond between a man and his profession is similar to that which ties him to his country; it is just as complex, often ambivalent,…
• The butterfly's attractiveness derives not only from colors and symmetry: deeper motives contribute to it. We would not think them so beautiful if they did…
• They sensed that what had happened around them and in their presence, and in them, was irrevocable. Never again could it be cleansed; it would…
• After the planet becomes theirs, many millions of years will have to pass before a beetle particularly loved by God, at the end of its…
• Conquering matter is to understand it, and understanding matter is necessary to understanding the universe and ourselves: and that therefore Mendeleev's Periodic Table, which just…
• I too entered the Lager as a nonbeliever, and as a nonbeliever I was liberated and have lived to this day.
• An enemy who sees the error of his ways ceases to be an enemy.
• The sea's only gifts are harsh blows and occasionally the chance to feel strong.
• For he who loses all often easily loses himself.
• The living are more demanding; the dead can wait.
• To destroy a man is difficult, almost as difficult as to create one: it has not been easy, nor quick, but you Germans have succeeded.…
• Perhaps one cannot, what is more one must not, understand what happened, because to understand [the Holocaust] is almost to justify...no normal human being will…
• We will not return No one must leave here and so carry to the world, together with the sign impressed on his skin, the evil…
• Today I think that if for no other reason than that an Auschwitz existed, no one in our age should speak of Providence.
• Everybody is somebody's Jew. And today the Palestinians are the Jews of the Israelis.
• We who survived the Camps are not true witnesses. We are those who, through prevarication, skill or luck, never touched bottom. Those who have, and…

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