Among Havel's myriad achievements, one of the most lasting is that he has helped to reorder our thinking about artist-intellectuals and political influence. Who is left to prize the fevered delusions of Sartre and Pound, the selective political blindnesses of Aragon and Shaw, when there is the clear-eyed example of Havel? Who is left to question that a thinking person, profound and humane, can find a place in real politics, both in opposition and in power? Countless countries still seem doomed to autocracy without a homegrown version of its antidote. Havel's journey has shown a way out. He leaves the Castle having provided the gift of normalcy to his people, and having restored to many others the dimensions and vigor of the liberal idea.Read the whole thing. (via Amygdala)
On the subject of outspoken clear-eyed dissidents from tyrannical regimes, let us also praise Kanan Makiya - recent target of a hissy-fit by Edward Said - an Iraqi who has been trying to alert the world to Saddam's threat for 20 years and now lobbies for a democratic federated post-Saddam Iraq. (An excellent overview of the Iraqi opposition, some of whom want a constitutional monarchy instead.)
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