Letters from Prison and Other Essays (Society and Culture in East-Central Europe) [Paperback]

Adam Michnik (Author), Maya Latynski (Translator), Jonathan Schell (Introduction), Czeslaw Milosz (Foreword)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Repeatedly imprisoned by the Polish authorities, and still in jail, Michnik is a founder of Solidarity. He is also a brilliant essayist, political writer and historian, as revealed by this collection of his underground writings of the past decade. He scorns the Soviet "conquistadores" who made the Polish people not merely subjects but also property of the state. His program of open resistance stresses the importance of ordinary citizens' protest in their daily lives. One essay spotlights Russian revolutionaries who supported the Polish freedom movement and paid with exile and hard labor. Another takes to task "doctrinaires" like Rosa Luxemburg, who saw the Poles' goal of independence as a mere anachronism. Michnik is an original, strong voice, and the fierce eloquence of his prose comes across in this translation. His message is one of hope; the lesson he draws from the Prague Spring is that change within Eastern Europe need not coincide with change in the Soviet Union.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

The importance of personal integrity when confronting an immoral political regime is the theme of these essays, written between 1973 and 1984. Such actions as refusing to sign a loyalty oath, even at the cost of personal hardship, distinguish those citizens who preserve their integrity and refuse to stoop to the methods of the powerful. A socialist who seeks to reform contemporary Poland and an intellectual who advocates an alliance of workers, intellectuals, and the Catholic Church, Michnik is an independent historian long in opposition to Poland's government and frequently in jail. Some essays draw on the long history of strained relations between Poland and Russia. Footnotes explain at least some of the allusions. Most suitable for larger libraries. Marcia L. Sprules, Univ. of South Dakota Lib., Vermillion
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 371 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press (September 23, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520061756
• ISBN-13: 978-0520061750
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #497,204 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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5.0 out of 5 stars Michnik on the Self-Limiting Revolution Against Communism, With Sophisticated Analysis of Dmowski, October 11, 2011

By 

Jan Peczkis "Scholar and Thinker" (Chicago IL, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Letters from Prison and Other Essays (Society and Culture in East-Central Europe) (Paperback)

This work traces Adam Michnik's political views through the turbulent period of the late 1970's and early 1980's. It encompasses the period of Solidarity's heyday, the period of Martial law, the murder of Father Popieluszko, etc. It also includes Michnik's essays on other subjects.

Poland was in a situation where, owing to the nuclear age, it was unthinkable that a land war would free Poland from the Soviet Union and the Communist puppet state. Any local violent resistance would be quelled, if not by Soviet intervention, then by the local Communist authorities themselves. Communists were very good at uncovering and neutralizing revolutionary conspiracies directed against them.

So nothing could be done, right? Wrong. Michnik believed that significant concessions could be, and had been, wrought from the Communist authorities, and rejected the premise that the kind of nonviolent resistance exemplified by Mahatma Gandhi worked only in democratic societies.

Michnik was critical of the Communists who, incapable to delivering essential services to the Polish people, wasted time in trying to humiliate them by such things as the "war of the crosses"--the forced removal of crosses off walls of buildings. (p. 72). This is ironic, because we have a "war of the crosses" waged in Poland today by the post-Communist left.

Although Michnik is quite hostile to the Dmowskian style of nationalism, which he considers chauvinistic, he is surprisingly nuanced towards Dmowski and his positions. (e. g., p. 282-on). Although Endeks are sometimes accused to being too conciliatory towards the Catholic Church, Michnik realizes that Dmowski and his policies had kept a respectful distance between the Church and Polish politics. (pp. 322-323). Michnik also moves beyond the notion that Dmowski had been too friendly towards the Polish propertied classes: "To Dmowski, the nation was made up of landowners and peasants, industrialists and workers, craftsmen and teachers--all those who try to build a nation-state despite foreign interests and hostile peoples." (p. 304). "Dmowski looked for allies not among those who shared his ideology but rather among people and nations that shared or could share Poland's interests." (p. 288).

Although Michnik regularly condemns Dmowski and the Endecks for anti-Semitism, there comes a point in which he does find an element of rationality in Dmowski's position: "This also applied to the Jewish population, which in the social structure of the Kingdom of Poland took the place of the third estate. Considering the absence of a Polish bourgeoisie and the poor performance of Poles in trade and the free professions, this was--in the opinion of the National Democrats--a real threat for the future of the modern nation as it was being shaped." (pp. 289-290).

As for Polish anti-Semitism in general, Michnik comments: "Poignant declarations against anti-Semitism can be no substitute for sober analyses of the roots of this frightening illness. The cause does not lie only in the faults of the Polish people. It is also necessary to recognize negative phenomena on the Jewish side as well, a task which by no stretch of the imagination can be interpreted as racism." (p. 215).

Interestingly, among leading Poles, Dmowski was not the only one negatively disposed towards the Jews' pro-Russian orientation. Michnik comments: "Pilsudski was not a philo-Semite. In his articles he frequently criticized the philo-Russian politics of the Bund, the Jewish socialist party. The Bund, which was active among the Jewish proletariat, popularized Russian literature and thus also Russian culture. There would have been nothing wrong in this, except that the orientation coincided with the invader's policies of Russification, and in such circumstances encouraged large groups of the population to lean toward Russia." (p. 215).

During his own lifetime, the author found ways to engage in intelligent discussions with those holding positions very disagreeable to him. Michnik comments: "I am also thinking of one of my professors, a prewar activist of the ONR-Falanga, who reached out to me at a difficult moment and spent long hours explaining to me the complicated story of his generation and his associates." (p. 179).

Unfortunately, Michnik's in-depth and nuanced thinking, as exemplified by this book, has, in recent years, given way to superficial reasoning, strident name-calling, and dismissive attitude towards those with whom he disagrees. See the Peczkis review of: In Search of Lost Meaning: The New Eastern Europe.