It's dangerous to watch staggering butterflies. They have a plan but it has no meaning. Gunter Grass More Quotes by Gunter Grass More Quotes From Gunter Grass ...I remain restless and dissatisfied; what I knot with my right hand, I undo with my left, what my left hand creates, my right fist shatters Gunter Grass left-hand fists hands So I have no grounds to complain; on the contrary, writers should consider the condition of permanent controversiality to be invigorating, part of the risk envolved in choosing the profesión. It is a fact of life that writers have always and with due consideration and great pleasure spit in the soup of the high and mighty. That is what makes the history of literature analogous to the development and refinement of censorship. Gunter Grass risk development complaining I am not faithful but I am attached. Gunter Grass faithful marriage I wept when the muse Ulla bent over me. Blinded by tears I could not prevent her from kissing me, I could not prevent the Muse from giving me that terrible kiss. All of you who have ever been kissed by the Muse will surely understand that Oskar, once branded by that kiss, was condemned to take back the drum he had rejected years before, the drum he had buried in the sand of Sapse Cemetery. Gunter Grass kissing giving years When Satan's not in the mood, virtue triumphs. Hasn't even Satan a right not to be in the mood once in a while? Gunter Grass triumph satan virtue Often I had to imagine the things I needed. I learned very early to read amidst noise. And so I started writing and drawing at an early age. Gunter Grass drawing age writing Writers know that sometimes things are there in the drawer for decades before they finally come out and you are capable of writing about them. Gunter Grass drawers writing sometimes In general, I agree with Jacob Grimm and feel that we ought to permit changes and uncontrolled growth in language. Even though that also allows potentially threatening new words to develop, language needs the chance to constantly renew itself. Gunter Grass growth chance needs My relationship with Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm reaches far back into my childhood. I grew up with Grimm's fairy tales. I even saw a theater production of 'Tom Thumb' during Advent at the State Theater in Danzig, which my mother took me to see. Gunter Grass thumbs childhood mother There must be reasons why we men are so hipped on breasts as if we'd all been weaned too soon. Gunter Grass breastfeeding reason-why men Melancholy has ceased to be an individual phenomenon, an exception. It has become the class privilege of the wage earner, a mass state of mind that finds its cause wherever life is governed by production quotas. Gunter Grass mind feelings class I shall speak of how melancholy and utopia preclude one another. How they fertilize one another... of the revulsion that follows one insight and precedes the next... of superabundance and surfeit. Of stasis in progress. And of myself, for whom melancholy and utopia are heads and tails of the same coin. Gunter Grass coins progress tails Students who don't want to get anywhere are sure to get somewhere. Gunter Grass achievement students want 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 volunteer criminals years Everyone is born into a certain era. I wouldn't want to see anyone faced with the circumstances that prevailed at the time, when there were few or no alternatives. Gunter Grass eras alternatives want I'm always astonished by a forest. It makes me realise that the fantasy of nature is much larger than my own fantasy. I still have things to learn. Gunter Grass forest me my-own nature Art is accusation, expression, passion. Art is a fight to the finish between black charcoal and white paper. Gunter Grass fight passion black art How do we prevent Iran developing an atomic bomb, when, on the American side, dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki is not recognised as a war crime? Gunter Grass american how crime war Homeland is something one becomes aware of only through its loss. Gunter Grass only something through loss Our minds aren't bound by a chronological corset. When thinking and dreaming, past, present and future are mixed up. That's also possible for a writer. Gunter Grass possible future past thinking
