Essay
The Captive Mind
Zniewolony umysł
Czesław Miłosz · 1953
Synopsis
Nine essays written in 1951. Through parable and allegory, the author analyses how the intellectuals of Eastern Europe submitted to the doctrine he calls the New Faith: the Murti-Bing pill, Ketman, the art of inner dissimulation, and the portraits of four writers designated by the letters Alpha, Beta, Gamma and Delta, each of whom shows one way of rallying to it.
Context
Written in Paris in 1951, after its author's break with the regime, the book appeared in 1953 at Jerzy Giedroyc's Literary Institute, as the third volume of the Kultura Library, at the same time as its French translation, prefaced by Karl Jaspers, and its English translation, introduced by Bertrand Russell. It at once aroused controversy, because of its author as much as its content, and appeared in Poland outside censorship only in 1978, then officially in 1989.
Who it is for
A little over two hundred pages of essays, which call for some knowledge of Poland in the fifties.
Prizes and reception
Regarded today as a key work for understanding the birth and workings of totalitarian systems.
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