At the beginning of everything is the word.
It is a miracle to which we owe the fact that we are human. But at the same time it is a pitfall and a test, a snare and a trial.
More so, perhaps, than it appears to you who have enormous freedom of speech, and might therefore assume that words are not so important.
They are.
They are important everywhere.
The same word can be humble at one moment and arrogant the next. And a humble word can be transformed easily and imperceptibly into an arrogant one, whereas it is a difficult and protracted process to transform an arrogant word into one that is humble.
—Václav Havel, A Word About Words.
I’d say that essay, while an interesting commentary on the power and constantly shifting nature of words, is also a pretty good demonstration of why Havel was maybe too bookish a politician. Words are like college, or legal tender: they’re so important mostly because we believe they’re so important1.
Which brings me to my (really kind of minor) problem with Havel which is that the regime that he lived under and fought against—with words—was one so centered on rhetoric that “just words” (HEY TOPICAL) were an abnormally powerful tool. Today in our2 plushy technolust Western Society, the erosion of freedom of speech is much more subtle (law is not the only means of controlling speech), and so words have less power because we attribute less power to them. Words alone don’t bring about change nowadays. Only endless repetition of words can do that. And money. you need money too. You need sooo much money.
1This sentence is more or less cribbed from John Campbell’ 50 questions answered.
2I can say “our” because you are on the Internet reading this.
December 17th, 2011 at 10:52
An abundance of usefull specifics as well as thought, as both versions a lot of people want, are relieved for that.