Polish literature can be interesting to the world. I’m happy to be the trailblazer. Olga Tokarczuk Read Quote
The views I have, the books I write, are read as political, or even as manifestos. Olga Tokarczuk Read Quote
The English book world is relatively closed to translation, so only a small amount of foreign language work can come in. Olga Tokarczuk Read Quote
Anglo-Saxons have a view that history is ordered and chronological, and I think that fed into the development of the realist middle-class novel. You know, the ones you read on your sofa with a nice cup of tea. Olga Tokarczuk Read Quote
I adore Stanley Kubrick, all of his films were different, not just in subject but tonally. Olga Tokarczuk Read Quote
But the fact is we did have colonies in the east of Poland, we did have a slave economy there. But this is not common knowledge – or part of our national myth. It goes against the current romanticised view of the government, and much of the country, that Poles have always been victims, never oppressors. Olga Tokarczuk Read Quote
Well-written novels make you more empathetic towards other people. You can identify with someone who isn’t you. You can change your identity. A 14-year-old boy can become Anna Karenina. It is a miracle. Olga Tokarczuk Read Quote
I think I always have many ideas for books in my head. It’s like a forest full of mushrooms. Some are big, some are small. Olga Tokarczuk Read Quote
