From Publishers Weekly A stirring collection of political essays, letters, speeches, autobiographical sketches, interviews and musings, mostly from the years that Havel, now Czechoslovakia's president, spent as his nation's leading dissident. Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Library Journal This selection of Havel's 25 best essays written since 1965 is a fascinating chronicle of the development and ideas of the greatly admired Czechoslovakian dissident turned president. Whether he muses on Gorbachev, his harassment by the police, or the ever-present danger of injustices being committed in service of noble words, Havel writes with clarity, wit, eloquence, a steadfast optimism, and remarkable courage. Although some of the pieces were already published in Vaclav Havel, or Living in Truth ( LJ 8/87), such as the influential essays on the nature of totalitarianism ("Power of the Powerless") and on the global crises of human responsibility ("Politics and Conscience"), this is an important book that belongs in both academic and public libraries. - Marie Bednar, Pennsylvania State Univ. Libs., University Park Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

哈維爾寫於二十世紀六○年代的那些「荒誕」戲劇的真正意義，正是對語言的「徹底去神秘化」。這些戲劇展示了一個世界，在這個世界�，言語沒有意義，或者說與一般公認的意義不同，也或者說是一些帷幕，在它們的後面，現實已經消亡。1968年後，當哈維爾被逐出那家戲院並被禁止繼續從事他對語言的文學探索時，他把自己的生活轉變為莊嚴的對官方語言的去神秘化：他成了「七七憲章」運動背後的主要推動者、它的創始人和發言人之一。