The world is a fabric we weave daily on the great looms of information, discussions, films, books, gossip, little anecdotes.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that our daily interactions and consumption of information shape our reality.
Olga Tokarczuk emphasizes that our understanding of the world is crafted through the myriad of information and interactions we engage with daily. Each element, whether it's a film, book, or casual conversation, contributes to the 'fabric' of our lives, illustrating how interconnected knowledge and experiences are in forming our perspectives and realities.
In practice
In a presentation about the impact of media on culture, this quote can underscore the importance of our daily sources of information.
But the fact is we did have colonies in the east of Poland, we did have a slave economy there. But this is not common knowledge - or part of our national myth. It goes against the current romanticised view of the government, and much of the country, that Poles have always been victims, never oppressors.
My books are not 'political.' I don't make political demands. They actually describe life. But when we look at human life, politics creeps in everywhere.
I think that first-person narration is very characteristic of contemporary optics, in which the individual performs the role of subjective center of the world.
I first read Sigmund Freud's 'Beyond the Pleasure Principle' as a young girl, and it helped me to understand that there are thousands of possible ways to interpret our experience, that everything has a meaning, and that interpretation is the key to reality. This was the first step to becoming a writer.
Well-written novels make you more empathetic towards other people. You can identify with someone who isn't you. You can change your identity. A 14-year-old boy can become Anna Karenina. It is a miracle.
How we think about the world and - perhaps even more importantly - how we narrate it have a massive significance, therefore, a thing that happens and is not told ceases to exist and perishes.
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.
Bribes are not offered in such a way that you can prove them, and in order to prove that I didn't accept a bribe, I had to run.
I love the old way best, the simple way of poison, where we too are strong as men.
And I watch my words from a long way off. They are more yours than mine. They climb on my old suffering like ivy.
I wanted to write a commentary on the Bible, to write about the Talmud, about celebration, about the great eternal subjects: love and happiness.
We can't plead ignorance, only indifference. Those alive today are the generations that came to know better. We have the burden and the opportunity of living in the moment when the critique of factory farming broke into the popular consciousness. We are the ones of whom it will be fairly asked, What did you do when you learned the truth about eating animals?
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