THE WIND WILL TELL YOU
MIROSŁAW PIOTROWSKI
‘The wind blowing all over the world will answer you, only wind will answer you’.
‘How many roads must one wander in order to become a human?’ – these are the words of a song by Bob Dylan, which we remember from our youth. This American composer and bard received a literary Noble prize. This most prestigious prize in the world, awarded in many spheres, brings also financial aspect, because Noble prize winners receive over a million dollars. That is why it was very surprising to see how Dylan was hesitating to take this prize. Finally, having accepted it, he sent information that he would not take this prize personally because of ‘other duties’. He did not say precisely what they concerned. Members of the Noble-prize committee did not hide their outrage about the Noble-prize winner’s behaviour. The previous awarded people and institutions reacted more than positively – even enthusiastically. When four years ago the Noble-prize committee awarded the Peace Noble Prize to the European Union, all prominent decision-makers nearly ‘pounced on it’. Also a lot of ordinary citizens of the European Union wanted to do it, who shared about over a million dollars among 500 million inhabitants, and intended to gain nearly 0.2 cent of it. It is very little but the European Union, which formally was established three years earlier, did not have many opportunities to show its range of peace initiatives. Finally, the chief of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso, the chairman of the European Council Herman van Rompuy and the chairman of the European Parliament Martin Schulz went to Oslo. They were accompanied by nearly all chief of governments and heads of UE countries, apart from British prime minister and Czech president Vaclav Klaus. The latter one stated that awarding the Noble prize to the EU was ‘a tragic mistake’. He justified it saying that this prize should be awarded to a particular person. It had happened so three years earlier when this prize had been awarded to the president of the USA Barack Obama. However, controversies were much stronger. They concerned not so much the justification, in which it was written that he was awarded the Noble prize ‘for creating atmosphere in the international politics’, but the time in which Obama was creating this atmosphere. His candidature was suggested two weeks after paying vow. So, interestingly enough, as this atmosphere was investigated – in the perspective of minutes or hours? This kind of decisions and justifications do not raise the prestige of the prize.
A lot of people are surprised by it and ask today: what about this Noble prize winner? Maybe it is necessary to look for the answer to this question in the songs of the latest Noble prize winner – Bob Dylan, who sang: ‘The wind blowing all over the world will answer you, only wind will answer you’.
AA
„Niedziela” 49/2016