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And here is where Keane and I part company. Keane cannot imagine a basically "honest" politician. I can. His politician is the tragic hero who rises to power only to fall. My politician writes comedies; absurd comedies on the surface, but, like his own absurdist plays written decades ago, absurd comedies that assume that a rational, moral order lies just behind the stage and makes what happens on the stage truly humorous because the audience senses in its ethical gut the presence of the rational and moral.

In reviewing Keane's biography in the Literary Review, Anne Applebaum says, Havel is "deserving of a better biography than John Keane's slightly peculiar one, which insists in perceiving his life as a terrible tragedy." I agree.

James W. Sire is the retired editor of InterVarsity Press and the author of The Universe Next Door. He is currently working on a book on Václav Havel as the "intellectual conscience of international politics." His Habits of the Mind: The Intellectual Life as a Christian Calling will be published by InterVarsity Press this summer.

Václav Havel: A Political Tragedy in Six Acts was published in the UK last year by Bloomsbury and will be published in the U.S. in May by Basic Books.

See more biographical information about Vaclav Havel on his official site, CNN, PBS's Online Newshour, ABCNews, Britannica.com, The Economist, and Civilization magazine.Visit Books & Culture online at BooksandCulture.comBooks & Culture Corner appears Mondays at ChristianityToday.com. Earlier Books & Culture Corners include:An Open Letter to the U. S. Black Religious, Intellectual, and Political Leadership Regarding AIDS and the Sexual Holocaust in Africa

Tony Blair's Devolution Revolution | Paving the way for peace in the United Kingdom. By Michael LeRoy Loving the Alien, in Sickness and in Health | Too many recipients of health care today feel neither tolerated nor entitled, let alone loved. By Diane Komp Frankenstein's Monster Returns | A discussion of recreating consciousness reminds us not to skip the footnotes. By John Wilson The New Age Is Over | Now that Neopaganism has replaced the New Age Movement, flaws in evangelicals' criticism are obvious. By Irving Hexham The Grove Press Bible | A former porn publisher gets in the Good Book biz. By John Wilson Everything Old Is on TV | Antiques Roadshow asks, 'What do you want to know today?' By Elesha Coffman Cockroaches for Jesus | America's most respected newspaper stoops to cartoon history at millennium's end. By John Wilson 1984, 50 Years Later | Stop the spinning, I'm getting dizzy. By John Wilson

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January (Web-only) 2000, Vol. 44