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The sea's only gifts are harsh blows and, occasionally, the chance to feel strong.

Primo Levi

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Primo Levi
Age: 67 †
Born: 1919
Born: July 31
Died: 1987
Died: April 11
Author
Autobiographer
Chemist
Novelist
Philosopher
Poet
Politician
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Turin
Italy
Chance
Strong
Feel
Blows
Feels
Occasionally
Harsh
Gifts
Blow
Sea

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I live in my house as I live inside my skin: I know more beautiful, more ample, more sturdy and more picturesque skins: but it would seem to me unnatural to exchange them for mine.
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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, and in general it is understood completely only when it is broken: by exile or emigration in the case of one's country, by retirement in the case of a trade or profession.
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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. Here we are, docile under your gaze from our side you have nothing more to fear no acts of violence, no words of defiance, not even a look of judgment.
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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, of everything he possesses: he will be a hollow man, reduced to suffering and needs, forgetful of dignity and restraint, for he who loses all often loses himself.
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Monsters exist, but they are too few in numbers to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are…the functionaries ready to believe and act without asking questions.
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Anyone who has obeyed nature by transmitting a piece of gossip experiences the explosive relief that accompanies the satisfying of a primary need.
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A man who would mutilate himself is well damned, isn't he?
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It is this refrain that we hear repeated by everyone: you are not at home, this is not a sanatorium, the only exit is by way of the Chimney. (What did it mean? Soon we were all to learn what it meant.)
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We must be listened to: above and beyond our personal experience, we have collectively witnessed a fundamental unexpected event, fundamental precisely because unexpected, not foreseen by anyone. It happened, therefore it can happen again: this is the core of what we have to say. It can happen, and it can happen everywhere.
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There is Auschwitz, and so there cannot be God.
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The work of bestial degradation, begun by the victorious Germans, had been carried to its conclusion by the Germans in defeat.
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The living are more demanding the dead can wait.
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Perfection belongs to narrated events, not to those we live.
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He could hardly read or write but his heart spoke the language of the good
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Each of us bears the imprint of a friend met along the way In each the trace of each.
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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 tidings of what man's presumption made of man in Auschwitz
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Everybody is somebody's Jew.
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Nothing can be said: nothing sure, nothing probable, nothing honest. Better to err through omission than through commission: better to refrain from steering the fate of others, since it is already so difficult to navigate one's own.
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Perhaps Kafka laughed when he told stories [. . . ] because one isn't always equal to oneself.
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Dawn came on us like a betrayer it seemed as though the new sun rose as an ally of our enemies to assist in our destruction.
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