WRITERS IN EXILE
21
its own great ideas - the American Constitution, the Bill of Rights,
and the principles of democracy and the American republic; and
Americans have to be reminded that there are people in the world
who are deprived of all this. America has to be proud of these ideas,
and it has to spread them to the rest of the world, because the Soviet
Union always broadcasts its own message: that it is Marxist-Leninist,
with the most progressive ideology in the world.
SERGEI DOVLATOV: Even questions of literature seem to me
totally insoluble, and I can say nothing definite about politics. I feel
that the tendency of trying to attack Communism by any means is
extremely dangerous. It's unimportant what the weapon will be–
nationalism, an intensification of propaganda, or the use of arms.
Such a tendency is called unscrupulousness and hides behind a fas–
cist thesis : that the end justifies the means, which results in a bond
between the end and the means.
I am convinced that if it were possible to take a survey of Rus–
sian emigrants, a significant portion, perhaps even a majority,
would speak out for the immediate use of nuclear weapons against
the Communists. Almost all the Americans with whom we come into
contact seem to us Russians to be leftists, precisely because we our–
selves are so far to the right that no one can be further right than us.
My own position, however, is that I could live comfortably in a state
based on lawful and constitutional grounds.
WILLIAM PHILLIPS :
If
I understood or heard Mr. Dovlatov cor–
rectly, he said that
we
are all on the right. Who're the "we"? Are all
the dissidents on the right, and what does he mean by "right"? I
think people like Mr. Dovlatov should learn to dissociate themselves
from a good part of conservative America, partly because that part
of conservative America represents ideals and interests with which
none of us can be in sympathy . In addition, there's a great myth in
this country that all conservatives and all big business are anti-Com–
munist. Mr. Aleshkovsky.
YUZ ALESHKOVSKY: I think that Sergei Dovlatov wants to im–
press us not so much with his liberalism as with
abstract
liberalism.
By the way, none of us here has called for unscrupulousness in the
battle against Communism, nor was there any mention of a nuclear
preventive attack on the Soviet Union. Why conduct a discussion
with premises known to be false? What do I think of American poli–
tics? I can't offer any recipes to Alexander Haig, whom I personally
like very much - I think he's a goodlooking man. In my opinion, his
