Postscript: For the Reader
Postscript: For the reader My last letter returned two months after I sent it. Yarostan’s address was completely covered by a large blot of opaque ink, and an arrow pointed to my address. There were no explanations anywhere on the envelope; in fact, there was no indication my letter had gotten any further than the local post office where the stamps were canceled, there was no clue as to who had returned it or why. During the past eight years I haven’t heard a single word from Yarostan or Mirna or Yara or Jasna. The “police capitalism” that imposed itself by means of its “historically available instruments” still rules today. I held on to Yarostan’s letters and the carbon copies of mine; occasionally I shared them with friends. Several years ago one of those who read them suggested I share them with a larger circle of friends. I hesitated because there was too much in them that could incriminate people whose lives are un... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Sophia’s Last Letter
Sophia’s last letter Dear Yarostan, I gagged as I read about Zabran’s self-exposure and suicide. On the surface some kind of monster died, a monster that left so many corpses in its train. I was horrified when I recognized the monster in myself and in those closest to me, those who gave my life its only meaning and goal, those who helped define my life’s search. My very dreams were contaminated by the monstrosity he stood for: the will to impose mental constructs on living people — which as Zdenek so perceptively pointed out can only be done by means of “historically available” instruments: guns, tanks, police and armies. You once pointed to a split in my life, the split between my “academic and journalistic world” and the “world of Sabina and the garage.” You included yourself in the latter world. I think the line you drew has to be re-drawn. I think the split w...

Yarostan’s Last Letter
Yarostan’s last letter Dear Sophia, I don’t deserve your pity. I’ve been blind. For over twenty years I’ve been nothing more than an apologist for a repressive ideology. You tell me you don’t have a vantage point from which to criticize my attitudes. The events I experienced here yesterday convinced me I never had a vantage point from which to debunk what I called your “illusions,” or Luisa’s for that matter. I parted with my own illusions far more stubbornly than you parted with yours. Jasna and I had to experience one shock after another before either of us were willing to admit we were wrong, and had always been wrong, about Titus Zabran. The extent to which we were wrong went far beyond Mirna’s or Yara’s dreams. I can now answer all the questions you and Sabina have been asking for the past few months. I can now tell you why Titus didn’t mention to me the lette... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Sophia’s Ninth Letter
Sophia’s ninth letter Dear Yarostan, Or should I address my letter to “Poor Yarostan”? As I read your letter I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. I’m certainly not the one who has any right to pass judgment on you. Thank you for not waiting two weeks to write me. In two weeks you would have figured everything out, you would have seemed so sure of yourself, and I wouldn’t have had a chance to see you as I’ve never seen you before: lost, confused, unsure of yourself. I felt much closer to you than I ever had before. For the first time since we’ve written to each other you weren’t my life’s hero but someone like me, someone who is drifting and waiting, who isn’t quite included in the activities of those closest to him. I see now that it makes sense for you and me to be writing to each other; we have much more in common with each other than either of us do with Mirna... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Yarostan’s Ninth Letter
Yarostan’s ninth letter Dear Sophia, Your letter was as painful to read as it must have been to write. How can everything be over? How can workers without illusions about unions march back to work hailing their union’s “victories”? How can a population that just woke up be back asleep? We’ve been hearing rumors of an imminent invasion, of tanks massing at our borders, but those rumors disturb us infinitely less than the knowledge that “normal” life has resumed in your part of the world. We had begun to take it for granted that our fellow human beings in other parts of the globe were engaged in acts similar to our own. The council office and the commune, the occupied research center, the spreading general strike, had all become part of the geography of our world. You couldn’t have shocked us more if you had told us a continent had sunk. I was fascinated by Sabina&rsqu... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Sophia’s first letter Dear Yarostan, What a marvelous surprise! Surely you remember Luisa. She was all excited when she came with your letter last night. Sabina and Tina, my house-mates, were both home. Luisa hadn’t ever been in our house before. We spent the evening and most of the night reading and rereading your letter, reliving our past for Tina’s sake, discussing events we’ve never discussed before. We were all amazed to learn how many years you’d spent in prison and we were deeply moved by the contrast between your beautiful letter and the miserable life you’ve led. Luisa and I traveled twenty years backward in time, reconstructing the world of experience we shared with you. I still regard that expe... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Yarostan’s sixth letter Dear Sophia, Your honest and moving letter embarrasses and shames me. I’m ashamed because I haven’t been as open in my letters to you. I’m embarrassed by your declarations of your love for me. I can’t honestly tell you that I feel or ever felt a similar emotion toward you. I failed to make this clear to you at the very beginning of our correspondence, at a time when I was nothing more to you than a one-time friend you hadn’t seen in twenty years, a stranger to whom you hadn’t yet bared the secrets of your life. My only excuse is that I’m not in the habit of expressing my emotions with words; my life’s experiences haven’t been fertile ground for the developme... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Sophia’s seventh letter Dear Yarostan, You’ll never guess where I am. Outside there’s a general strike. Everything is out of commission. Literally everything: fact ones, offices, transportation vehicles, even taxis — everything except the telephones, and a radio station that’s been taken over by the police. I ought to be in the council office, or in the research center where Tissie and Sabina are conquering the whole universe, or somewhere in the midst of all the excitement. But I’m sitting at my desk in Luisa’s house, writing you on the ancient typewriter I inherited from George Alberts when he left. I’m surprised it still works; it’s the machine on which I was going to type up my novel... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Sophia’s eighth letter Dear Yarostan, I don’t know how to begin. I can’t bring myself to tell you what happened here, i can’t even make myself believe it. It’s over! Everything is over. The sun we saw on the horizon didn’t rise! It’s as if everything that happened during the past few weeks was a dream, as if nothing at all had happened. It’s worse than that. It’s as if we were all dead and had come to life only long enough to dream we were alive. I’m home with Sabina in a world that hasn’t changed. We haven’t been able to find Tina. Pat or Tissie. Ted is in jail. And I can’t continue writing this letter because my eyes are so full of tears I can’t see. I&rsq... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Sophia’s third letter Dear Yarostan, You should be happy to learn that Sabina’s comment after she read your letter was, “He’s absolutely right.” With this comment, Sabina lit a fuze on a stick of dynamite. Her comment gave rise to a discussion that lasted all night and to some of the most bitter arguments I’ve ever experienced. During this discussion Sabina and Tina forced me to admit that I did actually make a choice of the type you described, a choice between Luisa and Ron, between the pedagogy you condemn and the “individual act of rebellion” you glorify. I had invited Luisa to supper as soon as your letter came. She read the letter as soon as she arrived but the only comment she made durin... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)