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Václav Havel: The President Who was a Specialist in "Velvet Revolutions"...
The CEO of M3 Communications Group, Inc. and leading PR expert Maxim Behar tells another of his many valuable and exciting personal stories in his author's series "Priceless Lessons," which he writes for BGLOBAL magazine.
The President, who was a specialist in "velvet revolutions"...
Vaclav Havel preached aesthetics in difficult and unaesthetic times, but his messages probably did not reach today's politicians.
Friday afternoon is a lazy time for Prague.
Everyone starts their car and speeds away to rest outside the city; that's why Mirek Zaitz and I have such a hard time getting to Hradčany, the residence, the reception room, even the house of the President of the Czech Republic — the traffic is just unbearable.
Mirek Zaitz is perhaps the best Czech photojournalist, and despite the unassuming appearance of his old Skoda — at least several generations of police officers and various security guards know him — the doors before us open without many questions.
"Mr. President wanted the conversation to be arranged not in his office but in the summer residence, which is very close," — said one of his press advisers, Jiri Sitler, the only one with whom I have been in constant contact for about a month, and adds: "This is quite unusual, even I will see the residence for the first time…"
The conversation with Vaclav Havel lasted much longer than expected. An incredible intellectual, playwright, writer, and prominent opponent of the communist regime, he has spent several years in several Czechoslovak prisons. He speaks softly, even quietly, so no one will think he can raise his voice.
Wearing a summer plaid jacket, he was calm and unusually lively for the afternoon. He enters with a glass of cognac in his hand, moves it to the other while we shake hands, and then returns it to the right, but as he sits down, he notices Mirek and quickly hides the glass behind the flowers on the table.
"Let him stand there, wait, I'll move the ashtray, right? The Mr. President doesn't drink, smoke, eat, or dance … If I don't bother you, I'll light my cigarette. I can show up in Bulgaria with a cigarette, but here in the Czech Republic, they don't allow me." Havel recites this monologue so surprisingly and sadly that several of his advisers don't know whether to laugh or if it's all serious. Nevertheless, during the whole conversation, we hid the lit cigarette under the table so that it was not visible in the photo, and for a brief moment, this took me back to my school years.
The first democratically elected President of the now non-existent Czechoslovakia has relaxed comfortably on an expansive sofa, does not touch the glass of water before him, and sometimes sips a little bit from the other — the one behind the flowers. He was always looking in my eyes and only occasionally glanced toward the large French window, through which a dozen people could be seen bringing heavy cameras into the other room. However, he said goodbye with a somewhat distracted look, and his words startled everyone around him.
"Thanks for the questions. It hasn't been so enjoyable for a long time now…"
The answers were far more critical. Havel talks all the time about how important Central and Eastern Europe are for everything that happens in the world and how then — in the mid-90s — the most critical economic and a minor degree political experiment took place across all countries of the region…
- I am careful to give you advice to you Bulgarians, and it's not my business. Still, you have too many common interests with Romania and Greece, and if you do something in common, will it be a federation, will it be a regional market, and then the countries of the former Yugoslavia join it as well, you may gain a lot.
Considering these words from our current point of view — in June 2021 — and remembering how potent the so-called Visegrad Four at the time — the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, and Slovakia — and how powerfully and quickly they were accepted into the European Union, perhaps this particular formula was successful.
Havel takes a small sip of cognac to show a movement rather than enjoy it and now moves on to literature and politics…
- It may seem strange to you, I'm even sure it will be, but the most essential thing in politics is aesthetic taste, to make public constructions with taste and aesthetics, to do it in a way that the people around want them to become politicians. The speaking style is essential, and no one will listen to the banal common phrases, which means no one will believe them. However, this cannot be taught in the university — you either have it or you don't…
Words that sound even stronger and more emphatic today, when the language of politicians often crosses all reasonable boundaries, and their very goals, attitudes, and ideas are increasingly diverging from aesthetics. But as the politician told me then, not the playwright Havel, this is not something to be learned.
When communism in Czechoslovakia collapsed, like a domino only in a few days, he was the first to invent and use the term "gentle revolution" to protect his people from anger, revenge, and negativity. He ruled "gently" with his prime minister, my professor at the Prague University of Economics, Vaclav Klaus, who succeeded him as President and created Europe's most stable post-communist economy.
He took his finesse and brilliant messages with him on a freezing day in December 2011. Still, he left not only his plays and books but also his forever good-natured smile and the memory of a good man who ruled a great European country … Such people are no longer just fewer; they are just gone.
… And when you land at the airport in Prague and see the massive sign in front of the main entrance, "Vaclav Havel," just remember that nothing is accidental in this world … Really nothing.