Posted by Kenneth Anderson:
Let Marianne, Goddess of Liberty
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2009_06_14-2009_06_20.shtml#1245536416
smile upon the protestors. But like you, I have grave fears.
I have no special expertise on Iran and so am only able to add my deep
concern, sympathy, and support to the brave people in the streets
seeking change in Iran. I also do understand that, from the US
government's point of view, it all looks ... complicated. As indeed it
is; I am far from indifferent to the concerns of realism and
unanticpated consequences of events in places we barely understand.
Still, at this moment, I would hope that the United States government
would not only support the specific rights of the protestors to
peaceful assembly and free expression - but that it would say
unequivocally that the United States stands for liberty and with those
who seek it. Is that really so controversial or so hard?
Unable to sleep last night, I found myself picking up two books. The
first is a now nearly forgotten Hungarian novel - yet one of the most
compelling on the events of the European 20th century, George Konrad's
[1]The Loser (1982). I found myself reading the chapters on the
Hungarian Revolution, its failure and the aftermath. But of course,
the core of the Hungarian Revolution, as the chapter notes, is that it
was a revolt less against one's own regime than against an outside
imperial power, the Soviet Union.
The second is a book of poetry - short epigrams, passages, sketches
from a journal - to which I have often returned in my life, Rene
Char's [2]Leaves of Hypnos (1946), his private journal from his years
as a Resistance fighter in the Second World War. When I say Resistance
fighter, I don't mean one of the "brave" French writers of those
years, risking a 'no' from the censor, I mean someone who fought for
years, rising to become the commander in charge of reconnaissance of
that zone of southern France at the time of D-Day. (The translation to
which I have linked at Amazon is by the very fine American poet, Cid
Corman.) I found myself drawn to this passage, No. 22:
TO THE PRUDENT: It is snowing on the maquis and there's a perpetual
chase after us. You whose house does not weep, with whom avarice
crushes love, in the succession of hot days, your fire is only a
male nurse. Too late. Your cancer has spoken. The country of your
birth has no more powers.
The original French, sorry for the lack of diacritical marks:
AUX PRUDENTS: Il neige sur le maquis et c'est contre nous chasse
perpetuelle. Vous dont la maison ne pleure pas, chez qui l'avarice
ecrase l'amour, dans la succession des journees chaudes, votre feu
n'est qu'un garde-malade. Trop tard. Votre cancer a parle. Le pays
natal n'a plus de pouvoirs.
Let [3]Marianne, the goddess of liberty, smile upon the protestors.
Yet I hope I will not find myself going back to another passage from
Char's poems, one of the justly most famous:
Bitter future, bitter future, a dance amongst the rosebushes ....
References
1.
http://www.amazon.com/Loser-Helen-Kurt-Wolff-Book/dp/015653584X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1245533048&sr=1-1
2.
http://www.amazon.com/Leaves-Hypnos-Rene-Char/dp/0670422568/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1245533618&sr=1-1
3.
http://www.eugenedelacroix.org/Liberty-Leading-the-People-(28th-July-1830)-1830.jpg
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