Initiation and initiative : an exploration of the life and ideas of Dimitrije Mitrinović

THE FINAL YEARS 187

was not a foreigner, he was a total human being. The nearest to a total human being that I have ever met.!6

In exploring the life of Mitrinovié it was this aspect of the man that I found most difficult to comprehend, leaving me frustrated at times with my inability to grasp his ‘essential core.’ Often he appeared to me like a chameleon, changing his image to fit the context in which he found himself. “Where, or rather who, was the ‘real’ Mitrinovic?” I would ask those who knew him. Their answers only served to fill out and illustrate the paradoxical nature of the man, seemingly full of contradictions. He once remarked that he never did anything unless he had three different ideas on hand at the same time, but he could be totally spontaneous on occasions and really let his emotions flow. Yet there was always the feeling amongst those who knew him best that he possessed almost complete self-control—that he was always aware of what he was doing. So, with Mitrinovi¢, as with us all, the ‘real’ person was revealed not so much in what he felt or said, but in his actions and relationships with other people; and amongst those who knew him what remained was the sense that whatever happened he was ‘for’ them, in the sense that he acknowledged and respected them as unique individuals in their own right and as such they had his loyalty. No matter how they might suffer under the onslaught of his rage or his criticism, no matter how they might disagree with him, they knew that in the final analysis they could turn to him and call upon him and he would be ready for them. Thus, Jack Murphy recalled that Mitrinovié

was one of the best men that I have ever met to disagree with. He understood the meaning of tolerance. He did not regard tolerance as, you know, just dismissing the other fellow and saying “Let him have his say, it is a lot of rubbish anyhow.” What he meant, really, by tolerance was, “You hold to your view, you have a right to it. Be yourself. You are a person. Think it out and go ahead, and I am going to go with you.” It was that “going with you” when you knew quite well you were drifting which was so wonderfully binding. Here was real humanism .. . He was one of the best-living socialists, in terms of personal life, [ have ever met. Socialism to him did not just mean a theory of state organisation. It meant personal cooperation with his fellow-men and even when we were differing most profoundly with regard to theoretical ideas on this, that and the other, that bond was getting tighter and tighter between us until I say quite frankly when Mitrinovié died... 1 felt I had lost a brother, one of my own family.!7

In this tribute Jack Murphy, in his own way, went to the heart of Mitrinovié’s philosophy and practice. Whilst so much of his writing and