Simon Wiesenthal Quotes

I have always felt that this story is universal. When I began to understand the details of the history, I felt that the most compelling aspect was not what happened, but what continues to happen and how it is denied.

'Fall on Your Knees' is really a story about secrets and family, and the idea that there are some stories or truths that need to be expressed.

Each generation drives its plow over the bones of the dead.

My father is the reason I am the way I am today. He's why I acted up and he's why I prayed to be the opposite of him. We made up before he died but I vowed to never raise my kids like how he raised me.

I've had every advantage in the world, despite the 18 years of silence which were nobody's fault but mine.

I think that it would be hard to find a family that didn't have a secret in it somewhere, and sometimes we know about them, sometimes we don't. Sometimes we have an inkling that there's something hidden, but I think that it touches everybody's life.

My parents wanted me to solace them for sorrows they denied having had.

It hurts real bad to have that protection barrier between parent and child.

I'm working on my relationship with my mother and father, but my upbringing has been very destructive.

After voluntary exertions on the part of our people to which the history of the world furnishes no parallel, is the old root of bitterness still to remain in the ground, to sprout and bear fruit in the future as it has borne fruit in the past?

I grew up in a family that despised displays of strong emotion, rage in particular. We stewed. We sulked. When arguments did occur, they were full-scale conniptions, and we regarded them as family failings. Afterward, we withdrew from one another and tried our best to strike the event from our memories.

I don't want my grandchildren to go through what I went through.

When I was younger, I was terrified to express anger because it would often kick-start a horrible reaction in the men in my life. So I bit my tongue. I was left to painstakingly deal with the aftermath of my avoidance later in life, in therapy or through the lyrics of my songs.

My dad was a different bloke to me and not very nice to my mum, although I never judge him. If you did, you'd become one of those people who is all-consumed by a fault in their past. And I haven't got the time for it.

In my experience, the men of World War II, the vets of Vietnam, even guys coming back from Iraq, are loath to talk about their experiences. And the survivors of the Holocaust, particularly, are often very close-mouthed about their stories, even to their own children.

David and I were divorced in 1980, and there has been silence between us ever since. Despite our decade of marriage and a child together, I was airbrushed out of his life. He never demonstrated any affection or gratitude after we parted. He fired anyone who mentioned my name.

There's nothing worse than saying the past is in the past, then dragging it into your kid's life.

Every woman has a mother, and every woman will have an issue with that mother and things that mother did or didn't do. It just depends on how you choose to process the lessons that you learned from your own mother.

When men hold their peace, the stones will cry out.

The wound that’s made by fire will heal, But the wound that’s made by tongue will never heal.

I think family skeletons are best left where they are-- in the closet

My mother's feeling about men in general were always a bit of a mystery to me. She had difficulties in Puerto Rico with the men in her life. Her brothers abused her. It's very easy to be judgmental, but more often than not, there are mitigating circumstances, and children are not usually aware of those.

I am intrigued by the way secrets move through a family and how events and perceptions from decades earlier continue to influence the way relatives view each other. Homes shape family histories as well.

I recognise why I have such a strong inability to forgive certain people who betray me. It's chiselled in, like a name on a tomb stone.

Families just have so many secrets and dysfunctions.