Writers of Conscience

I’ve been thinking about the basic decency of writers like Peter Weiss and Heinrich Böll, which is so evident in their work, whether or not one agrees with all of their words and opinions.  As young men, they were witnesses to the cauldron of German fascism and to World War II, though Weiss, in exile, was spared as close a view as Böll.  Both also witnessed the divided post-war world, the struggles in the Third World against European and American colonialism, the continuing political repression in Eastern Europe, the oppressiveness and spiritual vacancy of Western capitalism and the struggle of artists and activists to overcome it.  Through it all, they managed to be people of conscience, of decency, which was, and is, a hard thing thing to—both in their day and in our own.  To be decent just means to be human, but that doesn’t mean it is easy in today's world.