428
PARTISAN REVIEW
its learning di sability, tha n a nything Son tag or her critics said. The
ad was called , "Spend Your Vacation with The Na ti on a nd Cruise
Up the Vol ga, Aug. 5-21 , 1982."
It
continued: "Find out for yourself
wha t's going on in the Soviet capita l and heartl and ... on an
exc iting, aAo rda ble Sov iet excursion ." The itine ra ry includes
"exploring the Kremlin ," "picni cking, a swim , a nd folk da ncing on
Don C ossack Isla nd ," a vi sit to Lenin's birthplace, a nd duty-free
shopping in Moscow. The trip's "spec ia l fea ture," a rra nged for
evenings a fter days "soaking up the sun ," is "ni ghtl y dia logues with
leading Sovi et a nd American experts on the politics o f and pros pects
for nuclear di sarmament. "
I
do no t invent thi s. It is there. They reall y a re go ing. And it
will be, as they say, duty free. This is the j ourna l in which Sontag
chose to settl e her accounts with communism . H ere she is, proclaim–
ing tha t communism is as bad as fascism . H ere a re her criti cs, pro–
cla iming tha t it is not. And here is the
Na tion,
sailing ri ght through
it.
Sauve qui peut .
The challe nge to the Left is to be se ri ous about communism.
The challe nge to the Ri ght is to be se ri ous a bout fasc ism . The chal–
lenge to the intell ectu a ls i to be se ri ous, period .
