Kang Chol-Hwan Quotes

#1. At the time, I remained relatively calm before that spectacle of horrors, which is perhaps the most telling indication of just how desensitized I had become. The more I witnessed such atrocities and rubbed shoulders with death, the more I desired to stay alive, no matter the cost.

Kang Chol-Hwan

#2. The only lesson I got pounded into me was about man's limitless capacity for vice - that and the fact that social distinctions vanish in a concentration camp. I once believed that man was different from other animals, but Yodok showed me that reality doesn't support this opinion.

Kang Chol-Hwan

#3. Hunger quashes man's will to help his fellow man.

Kang Chol-Hwan

#4. [ ... ] The negative turned positive, black misery sublimated into heightened consciousness, suffering into solidarity!

Kang Chol-Hwan

#5. I once believed man was different from other animals, but Yodok showed me that reality doesn't support this opinion. In the camp, there was no difference between man and beast, except maybe that a very hungry human was capable of stealing food from its little ones while an animal, perhaps, was not.

Kang Chol-Hwan