Biographer’s Note

 

History books are filled with the names of transformative figures—kings, dictators, and despots of nation-states who swayed their masses by spouting visions of a brighter future. Yet in the end, nearly all those figures failed. And while the more interesting question might be why people let themselves be duped into believing that these so-called visionaries could lead them to paradise, I am left to ponder another question: Why were so many unsuccessful?

In pursuit of an answer, I have studied their failed promises and pledges to guide their subjects to a blessed land. And I have reached one conclusion: Having a vision does not make one visionary any more than being visionary means one has a vision. As the story in this binder unveils, a vision can be neither created nor owned by just one person. A true vision emerges from the collective soil like a flower, fertilized by the struggles of the downtrodden, watered by the tears of those unjustly punished, and warmed by the light of righteousness. All contribute to its creation.

Truly successful visionaries, those few transformative figures in our long history, have understood that a common vision is what binds us together. The responsibility of the visionary, therefore, is to draw upon the people’s imagination of what can be, coalesce it into what should be, and compel others to transform it into what must be.

And that is why visionaries are so rare.

—JD Hart