Straightforwardness

One of the people I first interviewed for Kathimerini newspaper in Athens was a Greek composer, a teacher and a gentleman, named Filippos Tsalahouris. Today, he sent me a text message with a quote from Dostoyevski (or Dostoevski - apparently there's a debate on the spelling of the celebrated author's last name). His quote stood in for a wish for the new year, and was very well received indeed. Fearful of butchering the original quote in an effort to translate it from its already translated Greek version, I'm just going to say that it was about the merits of enthusiasm versus annihilation... Inspired by Filippos, I started searching for other Dostoyevski quotes and decided that Dostoyevski was a really wise man. Not too long into my quotes search, I found this: "Much unhappiness has come to this world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid". What a lovely quote. Straightforwardness is a good wish. It can apply to goals, to questions, to the way we treat and perceive ourselves and to our relations with others. So thank you Filippe and thank you Dostoyevski (or the people behind the infinitely abundant and citation-lacking information on brainyquotes.com). And Happy New Straightforward Year! Let it be the first of many in poor, bewildered Greece...