At long last, the first biography of this fascinating and paradoxical character who has left his mark on the Central Europe of the past 40 years. Leader of the student movement that affected Poland in March 68 before engulfing Europe and the United States, Adam Michnik was a charismatic figure of the opposition in the 70s and 80s.
An intellectual activist, theoretician of political action within the dissident movement and friend of Vaclav Havel, Gyorgi Konrad and the non-Communist French left, he was one of the main advisers to Solidarnosc, and a major player in the 1989-90 transition to democracy. Meanwhile, he also spent a total of 6 years of his life in jail.
In 1989, he founded what is still the most important daily paper in Central Europe, Gazeta Wyborcza. Known for its influence on a society in transformation, it consistently supports reconciliation between post-Communists and former opposition members.