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" I am a writer who happens to use some tools of journalism. "

Svetlana Alexievich

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" I have three homes: my Belarusian land, the homeland of my father, where I have lived my whole life; Ukraine, the homeland of my mother, where I was born; and Russia's great culture, without which I cannot imagine myself. All are very dear to me. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I take a very long time to write my books - from five to ten years. "

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" I couldn't get published for three years. Then the times changed: glasnost, perestroika. So, for three years, I wasn't allowed to publish 'The Unwomanly Face of War,' but then it changed. "

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" I don't want to be like other authors and say that there are only a few story lines in literature. A story is like a human face. We have as many stories as human faces. You might have similar facial features, but they're all a little different. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I don't hate. I love the Russian people. I love the Belarusan people... I love Ukraine very much. "

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" When people talk, it matters how they place words next to each other. "

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" I was always meant to study the humanities; I was no good at math or sciences. When it came time for me to work, it was Soviet times, and journalism wasn't that free or interesting of a space. There was a lot of censorship; it was difficult. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" We were romantics in the 1990s and thought that communism was dead. But 10 years passed, and Putin came, and it became obvious that the process is reversible; that communism will, to varying degrees, return again and again. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I do not remember any questions in my childhood other than questions about death and about loss, and it was clear that the books that filled the house were not as interesting as the conversations outside. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" We need a philosophy for humans and nature to live together. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I can't rid myself of the feeling that war is a product of the male nature. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" Flaubert called himself a human pen; I would say that I am a human ear. When I walk down the street and catch words, phrases, and exclamations, I always think - how many novels disappear without a trace! Disappear into darkness. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" Hatred will always give birth to more and more hate, and love has the power to demolish the borders between us. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I grew up in a village after the war, and in the village, there were almost only women. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" Humans have occupied a position in nature that they should not. It is impossible for humans to conquer nature. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I collect the everyday life of feelings, thoughts, and words. I collect the life of my time. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I write my books at moments of shock. I meet people in extremis and their stories are highly emotionally charged. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" There is this tradition, stretching back to Tacitus and Plutarch, that history belongs to the heroes, the emperors. But I grew up among simple people, and their stories just shattered me. It was painful that no one but me was listening to them. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" From the point of view of art, the butcher and the victim are equal as people. You need to see the people. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" My wish is to humanize history. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" My writing is not just all facts and voices. I strive to create a text that works as a sign, pointing out undercurrents that lie beneath the facts. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" Being in the public eye is easy for me because I come from a family of four generations of teachers, so I'm used to being around books and discussions. But to write, I very much need to be alone. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" What is life about? Two things: love and death. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I have collected the history of 'domestic,' 'indoor' socialism, bit by bit. The history of how it played out in the human soul. I am drawn to that small space called a human being... a single individual. In reality, that is where everything happens. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" Putin is not a politician. Putin is a KGB agent. And whatever he does is provocations, which KGB is usually involved in. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" Showing just the dark side doesn't always work. The important thing is to show what we can learn from dark things, what good we find there. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I love the lone human voice. It is my greatest love and passion. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" I want to live at home. You can only write at home. "

Svetlana Alexievich

" There are many oral historians in America, but my books are made using the rules of novel writing. I have a beginning, a plot, characters. "

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" Freedom is not an instantaneous holiday, as we once dreamed. It is a road. A long road. We know this now. "

Svetlana Alexievich