Only a few months ago, during the arguments over Bill and Monica, the haughty, liberal American opinion deferred to European sophistication. Europeans would never understand our Puritanism. Europeans are more experienced than we are. Today, as they have been in almost every decade this century, Americans are back in Europe, trying to keep Europeans from murdering Europeans. Henry James wrote darker novels about what happens when newly rich Americans enter the gilt drawing rooms of London and Rome, oblivious of ancient cynicism.
Human failure is, alas, universal.
Maybe our current adventure in Yugoslavia will teach us, if nothing else, to regard Europe, once and for all, without embarrassment of ourselves or awe. Maybe, after our planes get shot down and our soldiers killed, we will come to judge the continent of Mozart and Shakespeare as no better or worse than Asia or Latin America or Africa. It is a novel about a European who takes a journey down the Congo, to encounter an unspeakable horror. Today's heart of darkness lies at the far end of the Danube. And the savages have white skin.