"I kept to myself this episode from my young years that was brief."

The Nobelist Guenter Grass:

Earlier this month, Grass, 78, made the surprising confession that he served in the Waffen-SS, the combat arm of the Nazis' fanatical organization. His new memoir, "Peeling the Onion," was then released and appeared last week in German bookstores....

"I would like to keep the right to say that I have understood this painful lesson that life taught me when I was a young man. My books and my political activity are the proof," Grass wrote.