The first association is the funeral oration of Pericles (495 – 429 BC), reconstructed or perhaps created by Thucydides in his “Peloponnesian War”. Association with the speeches of the new Chairman of the Sejm, Szymon Hołownia. At least in the circles of “Gazeta Wyborcza”, Onet and TVN, Hołownia has already become a friend (apart from Pericles) of Gorgias, Demosthenes, Isocrates, Cato the Elder and Cicero. He became a giant of inspired words, although previously he talked mainly about where he was going and how he was going, how he took his children to kindergarten, where his dogs ran, what he could see through the car window, etc. And suddenly Hołownia as a classic and innovator at the same time.
Readers can judge for themselves whether Hołownia is already Pericles or will soon become one. Hołownia (from the message): “Dear ladies and gentlemen, we will certainly not avoid disputes in the coming years. He is part of everyone’s life and the essence of politics. My goal is simple: I want the quality of debate and the quality of legislation made by the Sejm to increase dramatically, and that in two years you will look at the Polish Sejm as a model of culture and mutual relations, and not as the denial of it, so that you don’t lose your nerve when it comes to politics, so that it can finally give us all the hope that everything can become normal.”
Pericles: “Our political system is not an imitation of foreign laws, and we ourselves are rather an example to others than others are to us. This system is called a democracy because it is based on the majority of citizens, and not on a minority. In private disputes, every citizen is equal before the law; when it comes to importance, an individual is valued not because of his membership in a particular group, but because of the personal talent that makes him stand out; “Poverty or unknown origins do not prevent someone who is able to serve his country from achieving honor.”
Hołownia: “Democracy is governed by the majority, respecting the rights of minorities. (…) The Sejm is primarily intended for Poles who do not visit the Sejm every day. It will be closer to normal, everyday things. (…) I would very much like to open the Sejm to talk to people who perform important functions for Poland. It does not matter which party appointed them. I want to listen to people whose voices have not been sufficiently taken into account in recent years.
Pericles: “In our civil life we are guided by the principle of freedom. In our private lives we do not look with distrustful curiosity at the behavior of our fellow citizens, we do not resent our neighbor when he does something that he enjoys, and we do not cast him with contemptuous looks that do no harm but pain.. Guided through understanding in private life we respect rights in public life.
At the end of this comparison these words come from Pericles, but they could have been said by Szymon Hołownia without any change: “We always assess accidents ourselves and try to make an accurate judgment; We do not believe that words are detrimental to actions, but that you must be taught by words before you take action. (…) We also differ from others in the way we interact with people; We make friends by giving kindness, not by receiving it. And he who has done a favor is more secure in friendship than he who has received it.”
The tribute to the great Szymon Hołownia (obviously in “Gazeta Wyborcza”) by actor Stanisław Brejdygant is completely true. The elderly actor fell to his knees and expressed his feelings as follows: “With deep emotion and, yes, with admiration, I listened to your first speech as Marshal, and then I could admire the way you conducted the proceedings. After some years of stuffiness – I do not hesitate to use this term here – that prevailed in the Sejm Hall, I had the impression that fresh air had suddenly flown in through the wide open windows.
The air is fresh, but it is not easy: “Dear Mr. Speaker, all of you who have taken responsibility for the country on your shoulders and assumed specific positions are waiting for you, but especially the two of you, Donald Tusk and you, a truly grueling task awaits you. (…) It is not easy, Mr. Chairman. People with bad faith, who are so bad for some reason (or are they by nature?), will make you – i.e. harm us, the nation, our common homeland, which they cannot understand – with all their strength. (…) persevere, save my, that is, our homeland.”
It is a pity that our Nobel Prize winner for literature, Wisława Szymborska, is no longer alive, because she would have expressed what she should do to the Pericles of our time without the unnecessary glorification typical of Brejdygant. We already know the unprecedented pattern. This is a poem by Szymborska after the death of the great Stalin, “This Day” (published in “Życie Literackie” No. 11/61 of March 15, 1953).
The words of the Nobel Prize winner can be cited as an example and are dedicated to Szymon Hołownia, even though he has only just entered the first step of the stairs to greatness and eternity: ‘There is still a bell ringing, a sharp bell in my heart . ears./ Who is on the threshold? What news, so early?/I don’t want to know. Maybe I’m still dreaming./ I don’t come closer, I don’t open the door./ Is it morning on the windows, the icy spark/ Is so blinding that I look around with tears?/ Is that so? the clock that beats by the seconds./ Is it my own heart that plays the drum?/ Until each of you speaks the first words, / uncertainty is hope, comrades… / I remain silent. They know that what I don’t want to hear -/ I have to read with my head bowed./ What order does the fourth profile on the banners of the revolution give us?/ – Strengthen the guards under the banner of the revolution!/ Strengthen the guards at all gates!/ This is the Party – the eyes of humanity. / This is the Party: the power of the people and conscience. / Nothing from his life will be forgotten. / His Party dispels the darkness. / The motionless printer’s sign / will not transmit the vibrations of my writing hand, / pain will not distort it, tears will not erase it. / And that’s right. And that’s even better.”
We have no choice but to bow our heads to the one who will ‘clear away the darkness’ today, at the end of 2023. And he encourages us to “strengthen the guards under the banner of the revolution.” The time is coming when “the face of mankind” will be changed and “the power of nations and conscience will be revealed.” The undersigned is so “blinded that I look around with tears.” Hail Simon!
Source: wPolityce