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Alberto
Lorenzo is an Italian citizen who smuggles food and clothing to Levi at Auschwitz each day. Although such contact is illegal and strictly punished, Lorenzo risks helping Levi anyway out of simple compassion, receiving no pay or benefit from the arrangement. Lorenzo never appears directly in the narrative and Levi does not even describe how they meet, but he credits Lorenzo with his own survival. However, it is not Lorenzo’s material gifts that save Levi. It is simply his acts of kindness which prove to Levi that somewhere in the world, goodness still exists that is worth living for, rather than giving oneself up to be destroyed by the barbarity of Auschwitz. Levi never reveals what comes of Lorenzo after the Germans flee and the Russians evacuate, though as an Italian non-Jewish citizen, it seems likely that he survives.
Lorenzo Quotes in Survival in Auschwitz
The Survival in Auschwitz quotes below are all either spoken by Lorenzo or refer to Lorenzo. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 12. The Events of Summer
Quotes
I believe that it was really due to Lorenzo that I am alive today; and not so much for his material aid, as for his having reminded me by his presence, by his natural and plain manner of being good, that there still existed a a just world outside our own, something and someone still pure and whole, not corrupt, not savage, extraneous to hatred and terror; something difficult to define, a remote possibility of good, but for which it was worth surviving.
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Explanation and Analysis:
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Lorenzo Quotes in Survival in Auschwitz
The Survival in Auschwitz quotes below are all either spoken by Lorenzo or refer to Lorenzo. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 12. The Events of Summer
Quotes
I believe that it was really due to Lorenzo that I am alive today; and not so much for his material aid, as for his having reminded me by his presence, by his natural and plain manner of being good, that there still existed a a just world outside our own, something and someone still pure and whole, not corrupt, not savage, extraneous to hatred and terror; something difficult to define, a remote possibility of good, but for which it was worth surviving.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
