In a world without air all you breathe is adventure!
It is a violation which has obsessed the tyrants of the twentieth century. They do not want simply to kill their opponents, but to liquidate them, to deny that they have ever existed.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes the extreme lengths to which tyrants go to erase their opposition and deny their existence.
Helen Dunmore's quote sheds light on the destructive mindset of tyrants in the twentieth century, emphasizing that their goal extends beyond mere physical elimination of opponents. Instead, they seek to obliterate the very memory and existence of those who oppose them, highlighting not only the brutality of their actions but also the deep psychological impact of totalitarian regimes that strive to reshape reality itself by denying others' identities.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion on authoritarian regimes, this quote could highlight how historical tyrants sought to erase their opposition.
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War both needs and generates certain virtues; not the highest, but what may be called the preliminary virtues, as valor, veracity, the spirit of obedience, the habit of discipline. Any of these, and of others like them, when possessed by a nation, and no matter how generated, will give them a military advantage, and make them more likely to stay in the race of nations.
Sometimes you have to travel a long way to find what is near
Am I embarrassed to speak for a less than perfect democracy? Not one bit. Find me a better one. Do I suppose there are societies which are free of sin? No, I don't. Do I think ours is, on balance, incomparably the most hopeful set of human relations the world has? Yes, I do.
Spiritual seeking means knowing this negative part: that desiring is the root cause of frustration. To desire is to create, of one`s own accord, a shell. Desiring is the world. To be worldly is to desire and to go on desiring, never becoming aware that each desire comes to nothing but frustration. Once you become aware of this, then you do not desire, or your only desire is to know what is.
Victory is a fleeting thing in the gambling business. Today's winners are tomorrow's blinking toads, dumb beasts with no hope.
I shall try to tell the truth, but the result will be fiction.