“I know of nothing more beautiful than the Appassionata, I could hear it every day. It is marvellous, unearthly music. Every time I hear these notes, I think with pride and perhaps childlike naivete, that it is wonderful what man can accomplish. But I cannot listen to music often, it affects my nerves. I want to say amiable stupidities and stroke the heads of the people who can create such beauty in a filthy hell. But today is not the time to stroke people’s heads; today hands descend to split skulls open, split them open ruthlessly, although opposition to all violence is our ultimate ideal–it is a hellishly hard task.”
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, quoted in Maxim Gorky, Days with Lenin