1. Going through old papers I came across the transcript of a university debate on Rublyov. God, what a level. Abysmal, pathetic. But there is one remarkable contribution by a maths professor called Manin, Lenin Prize winner, who can hardly be more than thirty. I share his views. Not that one should say that about oneself. But it's exactly what I felt when I was making Andrey. And I'm grateful to Manin for that.

"Almost every speaker has asked why they have to be made to suffer all through the three hours of the film. I'll try to reply to that question.

"It is because the twentieth century has seen the rise of a kind of emotional inflation. When we read in a newspaper that two million people have been butchered in Indonesia, it makes as much impression on us as an account of our hockey team winning a match. The same degree of impression! We fail to notice the monstrous discrepancy between these two events. The channels of our perception have been smoothed out to the point where we are no longer aware. However, I don't want to preach about this. It may be that without it life would be impossible. Only the point is that there are some artists who do make us feel the true measure of things. It is a burden which they carry throughout their lives, and we must be thankful to them."

2. One doesn't need a lot to be able to live. The great thing is to be free in your work. Of course it's important to print or exhibit, but if that's not possible you still are left with the most important thing of all—being able to work without asking anybody’s permission.

3. And he goes mad. He is drawn into the world of the insane, who may not merely be mad; they are also able to link up with the world by means of threads which are inaccessible to normal people.

For many years I have been tormented by the certainty that the most extraordinary discoveries await us in the sphere of Time. We know less about time than about anything else.

4. Late this evening I looked at the sky and saw the stars. I felt as if it was the first time I had ever looked at them.

I was stunned.

The stars made an extraordinary impression on me.

5. Sometimes I am filled with a sense of absolutely breathtaking happiness, which shakes my very soul, and in those moments of harmony the world around me begins to look as it really is—balanced and purposeful; and my inner, mental structure or system corresponds with the outer structure of the milieu, the universe—and vice versa.

—— Andrei Tarkovsky, Time within Time (translated by Kitty Hunter-Blair), 2002.