Elizabeth Kostova Quotes

But we cannot rely on memorials and museums alone. We can tell ourselves we will never forget and we likely won't. But we need to make sure that we teach history to those who never had the opportunity to remember in the first place.

This recognition of the earlier human background, now so obvious to us, did not come all at once, for the inclusion of history itself in university instruction is an event less than two centuries old.

The power of historical fiction for bad and for good can be immense in shaping consciousness of the past.

Any experience that touches you, in any particular way, is good. It can be a horrible experience.

If I do a poetry reading I want people to walk out and say they feel better for having been there - not because you've done a comedy performance but because you're talking about your father dying or having young children, things that touch your soul.

I think people in general have neglected to learn about history.

I really feel sorry for kids who aren't interested in history - recent history, either, because it is this that made us what we are.

I don't think you should ever run from history. You should learn from it and embrace it.

Backward is just not a natural direction for Americans to look - historical ignorance remains a national characteristic.

Did I invent anything? I don't think so, not really. But if I've helped make history fun... then my work here is done.

Everything that we experience every day leaves a long-lasting impression.

Americans today don’t know history—even the smart ones who went to Ivy League schools.

Americans are in vital need of the instruction that historians can provide.

When somebody says that six million people died in the Holocaust, there is nobody in the world who can understand that. It's only through story, reading books by Elie Wiesel or Primo Levi, that you really begin to understand the trauma and how horrible it actually was.

I had access to books, and I could read... but that more foundational, basic historical awareness, I didn't have any of that.

I love history, and I thought I knew history well, but I was shocked by how little I knew about it.

I've been inside the Anne Frank house. You've only read about Anne Frank in grade school. I've been in it. I've seen the diary. Things that teachers couldn't teach you.

One of the things that struck me when I was a kid and I was learning about Pompeii was these figures that were frozen in the moments of their death. It is very powerful imagery, and it is very emotional and very evocative.

I was just a kid then. But I won't forget. Nor will others. There's lots of people with reason to hate the Church.

One of the saddest days of my life was when my mother told me Superman did not exist. I was like what do you mean he's not real. And she thought I was crying because it’s like Santa Claus is not real and I was crying because there was no one coming with enough power to save us.

I remember it as if it were today... seeing him [Che] framed in the viewfinder, with that expression. I am still startled by the impact... it shakes me so powerfully. (On his iconic photo of Che Guevara)

The wisdom of others remains dull till it is writ over with our own blood. We are essentially apart from the world; it bursts into our consciousness only when it sinks its teeth and nails into us.

What, however, left a deep impression on me was the reading of the Ramayana before my father. During part of his illness my father was in Porbandar. There every evening he used to listen to the Ramayana.

I was living in New York at the time of the 9/11 attacks. And I remember, you know, in those weeks that followed, when none of us spoke about anything else really, a number of friends of mine, people I knew, including very experienced journalists, I heard them saying things like, well, now we understand what happened to you.

I lived through crises. September 11 is obviously the biggest one that I've lived through.