Ilya Yashin Quotes

Probably the only place where a man can feel really secure is in a maximum security prison, except for the imminent threat of release.

300 was the biggest hurdle. They tried to hold us against our will.

Fetters of gold are still fetters, and the softest lining can never make them so easy as liberty.

Of what use were wings to a man fast bound in chains of iron?

I have never in my life walked with a harness. The weight of the tether, makes it feel like I'm dragging an anchor behind me.

It's difficult to put into words what freedom feels like. You only know what freedom feels like if you know what it feels like to not be free.

The only time you can be completely free from risk is when you're in prison.

I defend non-criminal detention.

If the bird does like its cage, and does like its sugar and will not leave it, why keep the door so very carefully shut?

There is one kind of prison where the man is behind bars, and everything that he desires is outside; and there is another kind where the things are behind the bars, and the man is outside.

Hee is not free that drawes his chaine.

During the period of house arrest, I had an electronic manacle around my leg for 24 hours a day, and for someone who has tried to give others liberty all their adult life, that is absolutely intolerable.

They weren't crazy. They were tired of being locked up. Even I could see that.

You can keep a person locked up too long.

I don't like jail, they got the wrong kind of bars in there.

There is but an inch of difference between a cushioned chamber and a padded cell.

I don't want to live like a prisoner.

No one is free, even the birds are chained to the sky.

Little islands are all large prisons: one cannot look at the sea without wishing for the wings of a swallow.

I should still be in jail.

You might as well expect rivers to run backwards as any man born free to be contented penned up.

They have the ability to take a person's freedom from them. On certain situations, they have the ability to take a person's reputation. And under certain circumstances, they have the authority to take a person's life.

On the wagon sped, and I, as well as my comrades, gave a despairing farewell glance at freedom as we came in sight of the long stone buildings.

Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage.

Yes, I was detained for eight days in Waziristan in 1996. It was against my will, and my passport and money were taken from me. I was not mistreated or harmed, but I was also not allowed to leave.