Yegor Gaidar
Yegor Gaidar is dead... I can't believe it: he was only 54. I have just read a transcript of one of his lectures ("Mutinies and Institutions") on Polit.ru. He was one of the few major figures in modern Russian history I profoundly admired: a great thinker, one of the best economists in the world, impeccably honest, courageous in this old-fashioned sense of the word that does not imply brandishing swords, but rather standing quietly on the barricade when every one else has fled. True to his friends, even when they were making serious mistakes, understated, modest, a real intellectual - he has saved my country from hunger and civil war in the early 90's, and has suffered popular hatred and slander without wavering from his course.
My country has lost a great man at the time when it needs him most....
My country has lost a great man at the time when it needs him most....