A few months ago, Ooana Trien brought this Havel essay to my attention, and read parts of it to me over the phone and I thought wow.
I took a screenshot from Ooana’s Twitter (linked above) of a stunning passage that could stand alone.
“Because the regime is captive to its own lies, it must falsify everything. It falsifies the present and it falsifies the future…It pretends to persecute no-one. It pretends to fear nothing. It pretends to pretend nothing.” (Italics mine)
Full essay here.
Secret police built a house next to Havel’s to spy on him 24/7.
They followed him everywhere.
I found this essay in 2020 and still reread it every few months. The kingdom of darkness has only a few sad ‘plays’ (compared to the infinite creativity of God) and therefore it is possible to perceive the ‘reruns’. Thank you for posting this.
Incredible. Thanks for sharing. It is horrible to see that same nasty and vicious society emerging in the west. How unfortunate.