University of Virginia Library

Retraction

Last week I published a
colloquium which censured
Yevgeny Yevtushenko for a
hypocritical attitude towards
the repression that exists in the
Soviet Union. The information
I used for this article had been
drawn from interviews and
from two articles on repression
in Russia by I.F. Stone. New
information has come to light
which may force me to rescind
my censure.

By some means,
Yevtushenko's interpreter
found me on campus, and in
the course of a discussion I was
told that Yevtushenko has
indeed protested the treatment
of Solzhenitsyn at least twelve
times in the Soviet Union.
Further, he had made a strong
protest against the invasion of
Czechoslovakia.

His interpreter, an
extraordinarily adroit and slick
conversationalist, said that
Yevtushenko has been and is a
very, outspoken figure for
human rights against the
stifling conservatism of the
Soviet Union. His silence in the
United States was politically
necessary because of the
delicate situation in Russia
vis-a-vis the dissidents. The
Soviet government is
fragmented and divided
between right-wing
neo-Stalinists and liberal
reformers.

Any statement that
Yevtushenko could have made
here in the United States
would have grave consequences
for the Soviet Civil. Rights
movement. Thus, he remained
silent here. Within Russia, the
struggle continues for
democratic socialism, and
silence is not justifiable. And
Yevtushenko has not been
silent. If this is true, I owe
Yevgeny Yevtushenko my
deepest apologies.

Nevertheless, there are still
some questions on my mind.
Should Yevtushenko have gone
on this tour? Would it have
been more consistent for him
morally to have remained in
Russia? Why hasn't
Yevtushenko been as militant
as Bukovsky in devoting all his
energies and risking his career
to change the Soviet system?
All of this may be a matter of
strategy rather than ethics.
And the latter question may
well have been answered.