Acknowledge his existence within you and he will assume the disguise of an angel. Once upon a time there was a man who built such a beautiful sand castle on the beach that he fell in love with it. And when the tide came and washed it away, he felt as bereaved as a king who had lost his kingdom. Something similar happens to all of us. We fall in love with our own illusions, and whenever someone points out the inconsistencies and contradictions in them, we feel offended instead of liberated.
Literature is struggle.
Countless writers have died to make of literature what it is. I make a list of our ablest contemporary intellectuals and I shiver to think what would happen if I were to live in a country with one of them as Minister of Culture. The fact that I live in a place that is beyond their reach is to me a constant source of comfort and joy. History books are people's efforts to come to terms with their own past by falsifying it systematically in order to make it more palatable. Underdog nations falsify their past by ascribing their decline to others and by portraying themselves as innocent victims of predatory nations.