I have packed myself into silence so deeply and for so long that I can never unpack myself using words. When I speak, I only pack myself a little differently.
Herta MullerRead
Some people speak and sing and walk and sit and sleep and silence their homesickness, for a long time, and to no avail. Some say that over time homesickness loses its specific content, that it starts to smolder and only then becomes all-consuming, because it’s no longer focused on a concrete home. I am one of the people who say that.
Interpretation
This quote reflects on the nature of homesickness and how it evolves over time.
Herta Müller explores the experience of homesickness, suggesting that while many try to ignore or suppress their longing for home through various activities, this feeling often persists and transforms over time. The quote highlights that homesickness can shift from a specific longing for a place to a more generalized sense of loss, becoming an overwhelming emotional state that consumes a person's thoughts and feelings.
In practice
During a farewell speech, one might use this quote to express the deep feelings associated with leaving a cherished place.
They can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends, as well as on the great mass of the society.
The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
Cynicism means the conduit to the soul has a great kink in it, like a garden hose in which nothing flows in either direction.
When you step further into the story you came to live, not only does the mythic territory open, but the deep self moves and the world of imagination and meaning comes towards you.
This civilization is rapidly passing away, however. Let us rejoice or else lament the fact as much as everyone of us likes; but do not let us shut our eyes to it.
Each day is a little life: every waking and rising a little birth, every fresh morning a little youth, every going to rest and sleep a little death.
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