Cosmonaut Quotes (5 quotes)
Poyekhali!
Let’s go!
Let’s go!
Attributed as his exclamation as the Vostok I was launched (12 Apr 1961) with the first human into space,
I am happy to report to you that the assignment of the Central Committee of the Communist party of the Soviet Union and the Soviet Government has been carried out. The world's first space flight has been accomplished in the Soviet space ship Vostok. All systems and equipment worked impeccably, I feel very well and am prepared to carry out any assignment of the party and the government.
Speech beside Khrushchev, at the tomb of Lenin and Stalin, Red Square, Moscow (14 Apr 1961). As quoted in Osgood Caruthers, 'Krushchev Leads Russian Tribute to Astronaut', New York Times (15 Apr 1961), 2.
It’s not for glory that Soviet cosmonauts are in this assault on the cosmos; they are motivated by a limitless love for and devotion to their country, the Party and the people, and by a desire to help Soviet scientists to discover the secrets of the universe.
In First Man in Space: The Life and Achievement of Yuri Gagarin: a Collection (1984), 104. Cited as written as a foreword of a book at the request of the author.
Several days after looking at the Earth a childish thought occurred to me - that we the cosmonauts are being deceived. If we are the first ones in space, then who was it who made the globe correctly? Then this thought was replaced by pride in the human capacity to see with our mind.
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The path of a cosmonaut is not an easy, triumphant march to glory, as some people make it out to be. You have to put in a lot of work, a lot of sweat, and have to get to know the meaning not just of joy but also of grief, before being allowed in the spacecraft cabin.
In First Man in Space: The Life and Achievement of Yuri Gagarin: a Collection (1984), 104. Cited as written as a foreword of a book at the request of the author.