Laws are inoperative in war
I disapproved of the fact that the government here refused to adopt the few reforms that Gorbachev put over in the field of media and the field of culture.
Today, when we live in a what is called Western democracy here. . . you're not taken seriously all the time. You can write what you want because nobody cares about it. But at that time, they cared very much about what you wrote, so that's an entirely different feeling.
If you live in a system that is suppressive, you don't walk upright, you always go with your head down.
People in the East looked toward the West with longing. They would have liked to have the same comforts, the same goods, the same chances. They saw a system that demanded of them sacrifices with nothing but promises for the future.
I was in psychological warfare in World War II, so I know psychological warfare when I see it.
And of course, in West Germany, they made every effort that people who came from the East would get jobs and would get a comfortable existence. That was part of the Cold War - and part of the winning side of the Cold War.
I have no literary fears.
Many conservatives were openly angry with the Bush administration over enormous government spending and the chaos in Iraq. I don't see as much independent thinking on the left, where President Obama is rarely criticized by his acolytes.
The deepest secret is that life is not a process of discovery, but a process of creation.
I'm obsessive about my job and I want it to be as great as it can possibly be, especially right now in these early parts of my career.