Censorship, Slobodan Milosevic-style

"I don't think one can speak of censorship here. That is not to suggest that I approve of dropping Peter Handke," writes the Serb playwright Biljana Srbljanovic, referring to the Comedie Francaise's cancellation of a play by the Austrian writer Peter Handke. "Mr. Handke was at least very lucky, for if what he has suffered is censorship, he has at least avoided a Slobodan Milosevic-style censorship. What I mean is this: every time Mr. Handke's (now deceased) friend decided to censor someone, he did so with greater efficiency and less noise: a bullet in the back of the neck, generally at the front door, or in front of a ditch that had been dug in advance, deep in the forest, a ditch into which the censored person tumbled. ... To be for Slobodan Milosevic has never meant - and certainly not now - to be for Serbia."

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