At one key moment in “The Breaking Point,” Dos Passos tells Hemingway, “The question I keep putting to myself is what’s the use of fighting a war for civil liberties, if you destroy civil liberties in the process?” Hemingway shoots back, “Civil liberties, shit. Are you with us or are you against us?”
- from “The Spanish Prisoner” (hat tip: Matt Frost). The excerpt refers to Dos Passos’ reservations about Communist involvement in the Spanish Civil War.
Will writes from Washington, D.C. (well, Arlington, Virginia). You can reach him at willblogcorrespondence at gmail dot com.
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When in doubt, consult the classics [5:30 mark].
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Arguments I have received:
“A dead guy can’t appreciate his liberty, can he?”
“If you haven’t done anything wrong, you’ve got nothing to worry about.”
“You’ll forgive me if I’m more worried about my wife and child than I am about your library history.”
I had an awesome teacher in high school who was a German man born before WWII. I went to an all-male Catholic high school and we would occassionally get predictably rowdy in class. He would silence us by saying (in his deep, German accent), “Gentlemen, if you are not with me, you are against me!”
Since he was also known to punch us in the arm from time to time with a large ring he wore, we were quickly ‘with him’ again.
Unfortunately for any of us who would defend civil liberties, Hemingway is orders of magnitude cooler than John Dos Passos.
According to Haynes and Klehr (Spies) Hemingway was some sort of KGB agent for a while. Whatever. He’s the greater artist; dos Passos has greater integrity. His USA Trilogy is still a great read, although the style seems dated today.
The “no enemies to the left” attitude that Hemingway evinces in this quote is responsible for the most egregious abuses, starting with the Bolshevik coup in 1917: the Provisional Govt refused to prosecute Lenin’s treason/collaboration with Germany in WWI for this reason alone. They were the first to be liquidated under the new worker’s state.
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