Pope John Paul II [antikvár]

preface When Pope John Paul II and 1 first discussed my plans to write his biography, the Holy Father remarked that "a biography must be more than dates, facts, and quotations " It must convey, he said in Pohsh,"the person's heart' soul, thoughts----" In the nearly two years that have elapsed since that 1993 conversation, 1 had the privilege of watching John Paul II and listening to him in the privacy of his dining room in his apartments at the Apostolic Palace, in his conference room where we joked in Polish, in the pubHc halls of the Vatican, aboard airplanes as I accompanied him on trips to JVlexico, Jamaica, the United States, the Baltic countries, and the former Yugoslavia, in great cathedrals of the world and modest suburban parish churches. I took the pope's advice to study in depth Polish history and literature— his own intellectual and emotional mainstay—and looked up old friends and acquaintances he suggested I should see in Poland and elsewhere. Then I took it upon myself to work through, with much enjoyment, his immense literary output: poems, dramatic plays, essays, books on morals and ethics, articles, letters, travelogues, homilies, and sermons. 1 hope that 1 was able to capture the essence of the persona of Karol Wojtyla of Krakow and John Paul II of the Holy See, and to live up to his counsel. This is not, of course, an authorized biography, and it is entirely my fault if I have not met his standards. But the Holy Father has afforded me extraordinary access and has shown me great kindness—which has made this book possible in the first place. For this, I thank him. And I know that he will appreciate that I have striven to produce as objective a biography as I could.