Lovely Light within Darkness

Within this paragraph, Anton's mysterious companion in the solitary confinement room discusses her interpretation of light and darkness. Her belief that there's a "kind of light people have inside them when they're in love with someone." (Mulisch, 38). The quote further emphasizes the overused cliché of "love is light" but her later connection to how darkness and hate can be justified has an interesting twist. The idea that a moral hate is justified when it is used against what is believed to be an evil, dark hate is a concept that is not explored and seems to imply that the only way to defeat evil is to become evil itself. This assertion seems to have many implications towards how the whole concept of how to defeat evil because if the only way to overcome evil is to become evil just complicates the subject matter. The fact that we become a "little bit unlike ourselves" (Mulisch, 38) while they are just embracing their true nature doesn't simplify it. Therefore, the author may be saying that it is impossible to fight evil without becoming somewhat evil ourselves.