Josef Brodsky, teaching at the University of Michigan, 1972-3. Wikicommons/Michiganensian yearbook. Some rights reserved.
Jens-Martin Eriksen (J-M.E.): As a student in the late 1970's, I worked in solidarity with Polish students and intellectuals who were building a parallel educational network to counter communist propaganda. It was a unique political education for me to meet these people and read the literature of Eastern European intellectuals. I remember a catchphrase from that period: 'Living in Truth'. Can you tell me something about living in a system where there is no realistic hope for the end of it? Western politicians at that time, across the political spectrum, would have told you to stop dreaming dreams about liberating the people of Eastern Europe.
Tomas Venclova (TV): The catchphrase you mention – “zhit’ ne po lzhi” – was coined by Alexander Solzhenitsyn in 1974, just before his exile to the West. It might be translated as “living in truth” – or, more precisely, as “living not by lies.” At that time, such way of life was already a significant social phenomenon, crying out to be summarized in such a formula.
