Freedom is not something that anybody can be given. Freedom is something people take, and people are as free as they want to be.
That's exhilarating if you're doing well, and very crushing if you're not. It leads, in the worst cases -- in the analysis of a sociologist like Emil Durkheim -- it leads to increased rates of suicide. There are more suicides in developed, individualistic countries than in any other part of the world. And some of the reason for that is that people take what happens to them extremely personally -- they own their success, but they also own their failure.
"The true measure of a writer's success is not in the accolades received, but in the hearts touched."