The girl possesses a carefree lightheartedness that makes Barukh feel more acutely the weight of the despair that he carries within himself. - Chava Rosenfarb

The more strongly I felt the urge to write, the weaker I felt in face of the enormity of the subject. I feared it, and this fear hovers over me to this day, whenever I try to write on the subject of the Holocaust.

a pair of eyes whose gaze spoke the language of stubbornness and determination. (chapter 1)

I have many times tried to escape the subject of the Holocaust in my writing, but I have never succeeded. No matter which road I take, it invariably leads me back to the destination that I most want to avoid. My personal life and my literary life have forever been divided into two eras, the era before and the era after the Holocaust, and only from this perspective am I capable of viewing both my own life and human history.