Eyewitness: Writings from the Ordeal of Communism

In a compelling, powerful anthology, 29 dissidents, escapees, ex-Marxists and victims describe dehumanization, fear and oppression in the former Soviet Union and its Eastern European satellites. Alexander Podrabinek, a Russian paramedic who was exiled to Siberia, exposes a network of psychiatric hospitals used to punish dissenters with drugs, constraints and hideous experiments. Stanislav Levchenko, a top Soviet spy before his defection to the U.S. in 1979, chronicles his protracted alienation from the ideology he once served. Elena Bonner gives a harrowing account of involuntary internal exile in Gorky with her husband, Andrei Sakharov. The 39 selections are by ordinary individuals as well as noted intellectuals, among them Natan Sharansky, Milovan Djilas, Eugenia Ginzburg and Arthur Koestler. With chilling clarity they describe the deceit woven into the fabric of daily life, the self-aggrandizement of the ruling elite, the Party's war against family and religion, and the brutality of labor camps. MacKenzie is editorial page editor of the Richmond Times Dispatch ; Culberton is associate editor. (Dec.)