WRITERS IN EXILE III:
A Conference of Soviet and East European Dissidents
WILLIAM PHILLIPS: I want to welcome you to this Conference of
Soviet and East European Dissidents. Also, I want to thank Al
Landa, vice president of the New School for Social Research for his
help. Congressman Bill Green is here to welcome you and to make a
few remarks.
CONGRESSMAN GREEN: I'm very much honored to be able to
welcome this extraordinary group of scholars from the Soviet Union
and Eastern Europe to New York City and to the New School. I can't
think of a more fitting place in the country to hold today's session
than here at the New School, with its history as a haven for refugee
scholars from Europe at the time of Hitler and Nazi Germany. Your
presence today is very much in keeping with the traditions of this in–
stitution....
I should like to put to you the question of what the nature of
intercourse should be between the United States - and perhaps its
NATO allies - and the Soviet bloc . ... It can involve discussions
and possibly agreements as to armament levels, issues relating to
trade, cultural and scientific exchanges and relationships.
I believe there are, or should be, certain overall American ob–
jectives.... Our first objective ... is to preserve the freedom that
we have here in this country. Next, we would want to preserve the
freedom that is to be found in other countries. And finally, though it
has been rather difficult to articulate and put into practice ... we
would seek ultimately that there be freedom in places where it now
does not exist.
I do not expect that this group of visitors can offer us great ex–
pertise in terms of nuclear armaments or international finance; but
certainly I know of no other group that can tell us more about cul-
Editor's Note: This part of Writers in Exile: A Conference of Soviet and East Euro–
pean Dissidents was held on May 9, 1982, at The New School for Social Research.
It
was made possible by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities,
and by the contributions of several private donors . Earlier sessions of the conference
were published in previous issues of
Partisan Review.
The Russian texts were trans–
lated by John Glad, Director, Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies at
Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars . Edith Kurzweil was responsible for the
organization of the conference.
