Memory and Identity: Conversations at the Dawn of a Millennium

John Paul II's last book, published in Italy on 23 February 2005, about six weeks before his death, and in Poland in March 2005. It grew from conversations he held at Castel Gandolfo in 1993 with two Polish philosophers, Józef Tischner and Krzysztof Michalski. Its twenty-six chapters each open with a short narrative passage or question, followed by his reflections. They are grouped in five sections: the nature and limits of evil, where he traces the ideologies of evil of the twentieth century, Nazism and communism, to currents of European thought; freedom and responsibility; patriotism, nation and culture, distinguishing patriotism from nationalism; Europe, its history and the Gospel roots of liberty, equality and fraternity; and democracy, including its capacity to legislate against the unborn. An epilogue gives his own account of the attempt on his life in Saint Peter's Square on 13 May 1981. It appeared in more than twenty countries, in English as Memory and Identity.