The characteristic satisfaction people living in this country feel when witnessing someone else’s misfortune and humiliation underlies the curiosity and excitement which erase their awareness that someday in the future they will taste such humiliation too, breathing their last in agony and horror, or suddenly, embarrassed, falling to the ground, on the street, in the checkout line, hit by a car, with the contents of their shopping bags spilling out to reveal hidden treasures.

Fragment of the novel Trociny (Sawdust)