Havel, remembered
A Czech of the post-1989 generation offers his personal reflection onVclav Havel life and times.
In the days sinceVclav Havel's death, Czechs and citizens from around the world have been slowly saying goodbye, paying their respects to a man who profoundly inspired them and whose moral presence the world so desperately needed. In the three days of state mourning, a space opened in which we have begun to comprehend the immensity of our loss, the depth of what happened to us with his passing. There is, within this space, the recognition of Havels great gift to us: not only the courage to hope and to see a future different and brighter than the present, but also the promise that politics itself can be caring and honest, humble and good, that politics can be humane. The gift of a humane politics is one that can now endure only in our hearts and in our efforts; it is a project begun but of course never finished by Havel. He gestured at itthis humanity can always only be gestured towards. It is, as all ideals, unachievable by our flawed and finite selves, the imperfection and vulnerability of which Havel understood so very well. But this, our inheritance from a great and kind man, is worthy of our reflection and, ultimatelyas our taskworthy of our support.
Thousands followed behind Havels bodyin dignity, with hushed voices and solemn stepsfrom where he had lain in the Old Town, across the Charles Bridge, climbing through the Lesser Quarter to the Prague Castle. As Havels casket was moved from the hearse to a horse-drawn military caissonthe same used for Czechoslovakias first President, Tom Garrigue Masarykthe procession spread into the square beneath the palatial gates, awaiting the final leg of Havels journey before his state funeral.
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