A Fiery Czech Is Poised to Be the Face of Europe - Biography - NYTimes.com
... "His behavior and attitudes reveal that he feels like a rejected genius," the agent noted in his report, which has since been made public. "He shows that whoever does not agree with his views is stupid and incompetent." <...> ... [President of the Czech Republic] Mr. [Vaclav] Klaus's sheer will and inflammatory talk -- the eminent British historian Timothy Garton Ash once called him "one of the rudest men I have ever met" -- are likely to have some impact. "Klaus is a provocateur who will twist his arguments to get attention," said Jiri Pehe, a former adviser to Vaclav Havel, Mr. Klaus's rival and predecessor as president. To supporters, Mr. Klaus is a brave, lone crusader, a defender of liberty, the only European leader in the mold of the formidable Margaret Thatcher. (Aides say Mr. Klaus has a photo of the former British prime minister in his office near his desk.) To his many critics, he is a cynical populist, a hardheaded pragmatist long known as a foil to Mr. Havel, the philosopher-dreamer, and a troublemaker. <...> Mr. Klaus's son and namesake, Vaclav, recalled in an interview that when he was 13, his father told him to read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn to better understand Communism's oppressiveness. "If you lived under communism, then you are very sensitive to forces that try to control or limit human liberty," he said in an interview. ...
... "His behavior and attitudes reveal that he feels like a rejected genius," the agent noted in his report, which has since been made public. "He shows that whoever does not agree with his views is stupid and incompetent." <...>
... [President of the Czech Republic] Mr. [Vaclav] Klaus's sheer will and inflammatory talk -- the eminent British historian Timothy Garton Ash once called him "one of the rudest men I have ever met" -- are likely to have some impact.
"Klaus is a provocateur who will twist his arguments to get attention," said Jiri Pehe, a former adviser to Vaclav Havel, Mr. Klaus's rival and predecessor as president.
To supporters, Mr. Klaus is a brave, lone crusader, a defender of liberty, the only European leader in the mold of the formidable Margaret Thatcher. (Aides say Mr. Klaus has a photo of the former British prime minister in his office near his desk.)
To his many critics, he is a cynical populist, a hardheaded pragmatist long known as a foil to Mr. Havel, the philosopher-dreamer, and a troublemaker.
<...>
Mr. Klaus's son and namesake, Vaclav, recalled in an interview that when he was 13, his father told him to read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn to better understand Communism's oppressiveness.
"If you lived under communism, then you are very sensitive to forces that try to control or limit human liberty," he said in an interview. ...
