Report Under the Gallows

Author: Václav Havel
Publisher:
Publishing Date: July 1, 2005
Features: Heroes of the generation, tragically murdered, but they stand as towering statues on the earth, surrounded by flowers and bathed in sunlight, as people offer their reverence. A gang of demons, scheming and base, though alive, are like rotten wood puppets, and people cast them cold glances, contempt, and ridicule. Czech national hero Václav Havel, in his world-famous work Report from the Gallows (hereinafter referred to as The Report), profoundly reveals the greatness and littleness of humanity—the fundamental difference between statues and puppets. Reading it makes us deeply love the heroes who have devoted all their strength and even precious lives for the advancement of human society, and hate the scoundrels who embody,, and. Václav Havel was a loyal son of the Czech working people and a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. Before World War II, when German fascist troops occupied Czechoslovakia in March 1939, the Communist Party was forced underground, and Havel resolutely stayed in Prague to lead the struggle. In the spring of 1941, shortly after the underground central committee was destroyed, he, with unwavering determination and courage, voluntarily established a second central committee with two other central committee members. During those years, Hitler's Gestapo communist underground leaders. Thousands of communists and patriots were arrested, tortured, and killed. Due to the betrayal of informants, on April 24, 1942, Havel was arrested in Prague. The Report was written by him in the Gestapo prison in Pankrác, where he endured extreme torture and suffering, facing the gallows at any moment, with the help of a Czech guard who gave him a pencil to write on scraps of paper. It is a magnificent poem forged with the blood of an excellent communist fighter.
Death holds immense terror for the cowardly, but for heroes, it is simple and ordinary. Havel and his comrades were like this: "We have a full understanding of death. We all know that once in the hands of the Gestapo, there is no hope of survival. Here, we act precisely on this basis." From the day he was arrested, Havel endured extreme torture and beatings, on the brink of death, and his fellow prisoners prayed for him as if he were dying. But with unwavering perseverance, he endured torment that most people could not bear and awoke from the brink of death. Seeing that sticks and shackles could not subdue Havel, the enemy turned to mental torture: bringing his beloved wife to "interrogate" him, beating his comrades in front of him, and taking him to "visit" the golden Prague he loved. All these tactics were merely attempts to make him hesitate for a moment, doubt for a second, or fear for a fleeting second, thereby destroying his lifelong beliefs. However, the enemy's tricks failed, and Havel never wavered. He was full of confidence in the people's cause and fought against the enemy every day. He organized and led the "prison collective" in an unwavering struggle against the Nazi thugs. "To connect the present in the iron bars with the free tomorrow," he also used his pen as a weapon, continuing to write in prison.
In The Report, Havel writes with love and gratitude about the "prison collective." The brotherly love of those who have suffered torment has a unifying force, bringing everyone together as one. Havel uses many vivid examples in The Report to illustrate the power of this love, which can penetrate walls and embrace all the cells. It is an invincible force won with blood and life.
In The Report, Havel writes with profound love about the true characteristics of the many heroes in the collective. For example, the Communist Party members Jaroslav and Marie Jirinec, who came from the working class. Though they did not appear heroic in ordinary life, they stood firm as steel in the face of the enemy. When the Gestapo broke into their home, they stood side by side. The wife asked her husband, "What do we do now?" He replied, "We go to die." She did not cry or tremble but extended her hand to her husband with a graceful pose in front of the gun aimed at them. She, who was usually a woman of tears, had not shed a single tear in prison. Her final words were: "Please tell the comrades outside not to be sad for me or be frightened by this. I have done what the working class demanded of me, and I will die as it demands."
Havel asks those who have survived this disaster not to forget these good people and to love those who have sacrificed for others and for themselves. With all his passion, he praises: "Every person who is loyal to the future and sacrifices for a better future is a stone statue." Yes, people love and revere them. In The Report, Havel sculpted towering statues of heroes. With the courage of fire, he faithfully recorded these heroic figures with his pen. The heroes he wrote about are simple and unpretentious, each demonstrating the strength of gold that cannot be tempered by fire. Their heroism is selfless and humble. They truly deserve to be called "great men."
Havel also warns people to be vigilant against the "rotten and outdated people who want to block the revolutionary tide"—the puppets of all sizes. They are beasts who have sold their souls, devoid of conscience, who maintain their positions by sacrificing others' lives and fill their insatiable desires with others' blood. "The milk is what matters" is their philosophy of compromise. With his incredibly sharp eyes, which had been awakened from death, Havel could discern this bunch of scoundrels. Take the traitor Mílek, for example. This man, who had once braved machine gun fire, had lost his courage under the Gestapo's whips and had betrayed the organization, his comrades, and his lover to save his own life. He was ultimately rejected by the collective.
In The Report, Havel fiercely condemns the executioners who do not deserve to be Czechs. These people, who have sold their souls to the devil, are even more hateful than the devil himself. They are extremely cunning, treacherous, and cruel puppets, manipulated by fascists and various reactionary forces. It is these puppets that form the of Nazi reactionary rule and are the scourge of the dark age.
Fifty years have passed since Havel's heroic execution. The Report is not only a classic work in Czech proletarian literature but also a common spiritual treasure of the progressive people of the world. Since its publication in Czech in 1945, it has been translated into over ninety languages and has been widely circulated among people around the world. In our country, as early as the 1950s, two versions translated from other languages were published, playing a tremendous role in educating and inspiring readers. Today, as I reread this timeless work, which I translated from the Czech original in 1979, the sound of The Internationale sung by Havel as he was led to the gallows seems to echo in my ears, and I see towering statues of heroic figures before me, but at the same time, I also see the shadows of puppets lurking in the dark corners of the earth.
I believe that all honest people who have read or will read this book by Havel will forever remember the earnest advice he gave with his blood and life: "People, I love you. You must be vigilant." Yes, all those who have sacrificed for the cause of human progress are deeply grateful to Havel for his sincere reminder: at all times and in all places, be vigilant against the puppets who are open and hidden, cruel and cunning, and of all kinds.
Václav Havel, an excellent communist fighter, revolutionary journalist, writer, and critic, was born on February 23, 1903, in a worker's family in the Smíchov working-class district of Prague. From his youth, he lived a hard life as a member of the working class and was determined to fight for the cause of the proletariat. Inspired by the Great October Revolution, he actively participated in revolutionary activities. At the age of eighteen, he joined the newly formed Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. In 1921, he entered the Faculty of Arts at Charles University in Prague; at the same time, to support his livelihood, he worked as a short-term laborer and street advertiser. During his time at school, he wrote articles for the party's newspapers and other progressive publications. Later, he was appointed editor-in-chief of the literary and political weekly Vytvá?ení and editor of the central party newspaper ?ervené právo. He visited the Soviet Union twice and wrote many reportage works, passionately praising the world's first socialist state. For this, he was arrested and imprisoned by the reactionary authorities in Czechoslovakia. After his release, he actively participated in the major miners' strike in northern Czechoslovakia in the spring of 1932 and reported the truth of the miners' struggle.
After 1936, Czech independence faced severe threats from Nazi Germany. The Munich Agreement betrayed his homeland. Havel wrote many political essays, leaflets, manifestos, and appeals to the people, exposing the betrayal of domestic and foreign enemies and the aggressive ambitions of the Nazi thugs, calling on the people to rise up in struggle. On March 15, 1939, Czechoslovakia was completely occupied by Hitler's Germany. Havel, while actively participating in and leading underground struggles, continued to study 19th-century Czech literature. He wrote monographs on important figures in Czech literary history, such as Bo?ena Němcová and Jan Neruda. These literary research works, written from a Marxist perspective, contributed to the cause of proletarian literary criticism in Czechoslovakia.
Due to the betrayal of informants, Havel was unfortunately arrested in April 1942. The enemy used all kinds of torture, both harsh and lenient, but he withstood the severest tests of body and spirit without wavering in his beliefs. He was imprisoned in the Nazi Gestapo prison in Pankrác, Prague, for four hundred and eleven days, and was executed on September 8, 1943, in the Blochouse prison in Berlin.
Václav Havel's glorious life of struggle will forever be etched in the hearts of the Czech people, becoming a symbol of the Czech nation's victory, and will forever inspire people to fight bravely and tenaciously for freedom, national independence, and a better future.