"And suddenly, like light in darkness, the real truth broke in upon me; the simple fact of Man, which I had forgotten, which had lain deep buried and out of sight; the idea of community, of unity"
About this Quote
The subtext is an indictment of the conditions that make that “simple fact” forgettable. “Forgotten” and “deep buried” suggest a society that trains people to misrecognize one another - to treat isolation, hierarchy, and private survival as normal. In Toller's world, community isn’t sentimental; it’s a suppressed instinct resurfacing under pressure. The clause structure mirrors that pressure: stacked appositives (“which I had forgotten, which had lain deep buried...”) create the sensation of excavation, like he’s clawing his way down to something obvious that ideology has covered up.
Context sharpens the stakes. Toller was a dramatist forged in the trauma of World War I and the revolutionary turbulence of Weimar Germany, briefly entangled with the Bavarian Soviet Republic and later crushed by reaction and exile. Read against that biography, “unity” isn’t a vague moral wish; it’s a political demand born from mass death, shattered states, and the discovery that individual conscience means little without collective structures. The line performs a classic Tolleresque move: lyric interiority drafted into public urgency, turning personal illumination into a call for solidarity.
Quote Details
| Topic | Peace |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Toller, Ernst. (2026, January 17). And suddenly, like light in darkness, the real truth broke in upon me; the simple fact of Man, which I had forgotten, which had lain deep buried and out of sight; the idea of community, of unity. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/and-suddenly-like-light-in-darkness-the-real-53028/
Chicago Style
Toller, Ernst. "And suddenly, like light in darkness, the real truth broke in upon me; the simple fact of Man, which I had forgotten, which had lain deep buried and out of sight; the idea of community, of unity." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/and-suddenly-like-light-in-darkness-the-real-53028/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"And suddenly, like light in darkness, the real truth broke in upon me; the simple fact of Man, which I had forgotten, which had lain deep buried and out of sight; the idea of community, of unity." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/and-suddenly-like-light-in-darkness-the-real-53028/. Accessed 18 Feb. 2026.
