“To live and to write, it's all the same, both together, for the pen is my spade”

— Imre Kertész, book Kaddish for an Unborn Child

Kaddish for a Child Not Born (1990)
Context: To live and to write, it's all the same, both together, for the pen is my spade; when I look ahead I only look back, when I stare at the paper I only see the past: she crossed that bluish green carpet as if she were crossing the sea because she wanted to talk to me, for she found out that I was "B.", author and literary translator, one of whose "works" had read, and which she definitely wanted to discuss with me, she said, and we talked and talked until we talked ourselves into bed — Good God! — and continued to talk even then, uninterrupted.

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Imre Kertész61

Hungarian writer 1929–2016

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“To live and to write, it's all the same, both together, for the pen is my spade”

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