You could grow up in Germany in the postwar years without ever meeting a Jewish person. There were small communities in Frankfurt or Berlin, but in a provincial town in south Germany, Jewish people didn't exist.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on the absence of diversity and the ignorance of historical realities in certain communities.
W. G. Sebald's quote highlights the significant societal and cultural gaps that can exist within communities, particularly in the context of postwar Germany. It indicates that one's upbringing in a homogenous environment can lead to a lack of awareness about crucial historical events and diverse populations, underscoring the importance of exposure to different cultures and perspectives to foster understanding and empathy.
In practice
In a presentation on cultural awareness, you could use this quote to illustrate the importance of diversity in society.
How happily, said Austerlitz, have I sat over a book in the deepening twilight until I could no longer make out the words and my mind began to wander, and how secure have I felt seated at the desk in my house in the dark night, just watching the tip of my pencil in the lamplight following its shadow, as if of its own accord and with perfect fidelity, while that shadow moved regularly from left to right, line by line, over the ruled paper.
When I was a boy, I'd hide under the kitchen table and wind string around the chairs. I have a sense now that I am pulling on those threads. The more I pull, the more it comes unraveled.
If you're based in two places, on a bad day you see only the disadvantages everywhere. On a bad day, returning to Germany brings back all kinds of spectres from the past.
The seasons and the years came and went...and always...one was, as the crow flies, about 2,000 km away - but from where? - and day by day hour by hour, with every beat of the pulse, one lost more and more of one's qualities, became less comprehensible to oneself, increasingly abstract.
No matter whether one is flying over Newfoundland or the sea of lights that stretches from Boston to Philadelphia after nightfall, over the Arabian deserts which gleam like mother-of-pearl, over the Ruhr or the city of Frankfurt, it is as though there were no people, only the things they have made and in which they are hiding.
Physicists now say there is no such thing as time: everything co-exists. Chronology is entirely artificial and essentially determined by emotion. Contiguity suggests layers of things, the past and present somehow coalescing or co-existing.
Estrangement shows itself precisely in the elimination of distance between people.
To depend upon a profession is a less odious form of slavery than to depend upon a father.
From the point of view of the meditative traditions the entire society is suffering from attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
I am often asked the question How can the masses permit themselves to be exploited by the few. The answer is By being persuaded to identify with them.
As soon as men know that they can kill without fear of punishment or blame, they kill; or at least they encourage killers with approving smiles.
To give aid to every poor man is far beyond the reach and power of every man. Care of the poor is incumbent on society as a whole.
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