Abram Tertz, from Novy Mir critic to symbol of the Soviet dissident movement
At his February 1966 trial, Sinyavsky pleaded not guilty — rare in a Soviet political trial. Historian Fred Coleman called this moment "the birth of the modern Soviet dissident movement."
Soviet literary scholar, critic, and writer. A Candidate of Philological Sciences (1952), he worked at the Gorky Institute of World Literature and taught at Moscow State University and the Moscow Art Theatre School. He became a leading critic at Aleksandr Tvardovsky's Novy Mir, then the most liberal legal Soviet publication, while publishing satirical fiction and the essay "On Socialist Realism" (1959) in the West as Abram Tertz. In 1966, he and Yuli Daniel became the first Soviet writers convicted for fiction alone; their show trial is seen as the birth of the modern Soviet dissident movement. After six years in Dubravlag labour camp, he emigrated to France in 1973 and became professor of Russian literature at the Sorbonne, co-founding the journal Sintaksis.
Career Timeline
- 1949Graduated from Moscow State University, philology
- 1952Candidate of Philological Sciences; joined IMLI
- 1955–1965Published fiction and essays in the West as Abram Tertz
- 1950년대 말–1965Leading literary critic, Novy Mir
- 1960Admitted to Union of Soviet Writers
- 1966Sentenced to 7 years for anti-Soviet agitation; imprisoned at Dubravlag
- 1971Released early
- 1973–1997Professor of Russian literature, Sorbonne; co-founded Sintaksis