Vladimir Bukovsky passed away on 27 October, 2019. See the obituary page.
The funeral of our dear, unique Vladimir Bukovsky took place on 19 November 2019 at the Highgate Cemetery in London, with due reverence and solemnity. Our heartfelt gratitude to Father Konstantinos, the Greek Orthodox priest who administered the last rites to Vladimir shortly before he passed away, and who conducted the funeral service with such inspiration and warmth. The funeral was dignified by the presence of the Honourable Arkady Jozef Rzegocki, Ambassador of the Republic of Poland to the UK, Polish Consul-General Mr. Mateusz Stasiek, representatives of “Fighting Solidarity” who remained at the service and interment displaying the “Solidarity” flag, and those Polish people in London who attended. The Ambassador read out a moving tribute to Vladimir from Mariusz Morawiecki, the Prime Minister of the Polish Republic, expressing profound respect for Vladimir’s concern about the fate of Poland and her people. Two exquisite wreaths composed of red and white flowers, the colours of the Polish national flag, were laid by a uniformed officer of the Polish army. We can never be sufficiently grateful to them for dignifying the funeral by their presence, and the hand of friendship they extended to those seeing Vladimir start his final journey. The leadership of the Polish government was the only one of former Soviet oppressed countries to honour Vladimir’s memory in this way, but Polish gallantry and commitment to the rules of honour are legendary.
Dziekujemy bardzo udzial w pogrzebie Wladimira
Olga Ivanova, Vladimir’s sister
Pavel Stroilov, historian and lawyer
Alyona Kojevnikov, translator of “Judgment in Moscow”
Cambridge, UK
27 October 2019, 9:30 PM GMT
Vladimir Bukovsky (76)
Born 30 December, 1942
Died 27 October 2019
Media contact: Elizabeth Childs, Bukovsky Center info@VladimirBukovsky.com +1 (510) 547-2589
URL for obituary: vladimirbukovsky.com/obit
Vladimir Konstantinovich Bukovsky, once dubbed “a hero of almost legendary proportion among the Soviet dissident movement” by the New York Times, died of cardiac arrest in Addenbrookes Hospital, in Cambridge, England at 9:46 PM Greenwich Time on 27 October, 2019. He was 76. His health had been poor in recent years.
A gifted writer, Bukovsky was revered for his ability to document both the daily insults and grand oppression of Soviet prison life, and to convey with detail the soul-crushing effects of torture on both prisoner and jailer.
Bukovsky's longtime friend and translator, Alyona Kojevnikov, spoke from the hospital: “A very dear friend of many, a brilliant interlocutor, a man of amazing courage and integrity. God rest his soul. They broke the mould after he was made.”
Novelist Vladimir Nabokov praised him as a "courageous and precious man" in a 1974 letter to the editor of The Observer. Nabokov wrote, "Bukovsky's heroic speech to the court in defense of freedom, and his five years of martyrdom in a despicable psychiatric jail will be remembered long after the torturers he defied have rotted away."
Historian and former CIA analyst Richard Pipes said shortly before his death, "Vladimir Bukovsky was an outstanding dissident both in the Soviet Union and abroad, and a man who courageously identified and criticized the totalitarian policies of Moscow. He ought to be remembered as a true hero."
Edward Lucas, editor of Standpoint, said, "Vladimir Bukovsky was a moral and political titan in the existential struggle of the Cold War. His courage and clarity inspired a generation and fueled the victory of dignity, freedom, and justice. Moreover, he also saw that the victory was incomplete--sounding the alarm about Russia's unburied totalitarian and imperialist history."
A leading Russian human rights writer and activist, Bukovsky spent a total of 12 years imprisoned by the USSR. After his release to the West in 1976, he spent his last four decades writing and campaigning against successive regimes in his homeland.
Bukovsky first gained notoriety as a student writer and organizer in Moscow. In 1963, he was arrested for possessing forbidden literature. Rather than put him on trial, Soviet authorities had him declared mentally ill and locked him in a psychiatric hospital -- a common tactic used in the USSR to discredit dissenters and confine them without appearing to be holding political prisoners. He was arrested again in 1967 and sent to a labor camp for three years.
After his release, Bukovsky created an international uproar when he had psychiatric hospital records for six well-known dissidents smuggled to the West in 1971. International psychiatrists’ organizations studied the records and charged Soviet doctors and the government with creating false diagnoses as a way to indefinitely detain possibly thousands of political opponents who showed no medically recognized symptoms of mental illness.
After another prison sentence, In 1976, Bukovsky was deported from the USSR and exchanged by the Soviet government for Luis Corvalán, the imprisoned general secretary of the Communist Party of Chile.
After his release, he settled in Cambridge, England. He authored a best-selling memoir, To Build a Castle, appeared on American TV shows, and met with President Carter at the White House. His most recent book, Judgment In Moscow: Soviet Crimes and Western Complicity (Ninth of November Press) published in English on May 14, 2019, analyzes thousands of pages of top secret Soviet archives he stole in 1992.
Over four decades, Bukovsky played key roles in several political organizations, including Resistance International, Human Rights Foundation, the Cato Institute, and the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, which awarded him their Truman-Reagan Medal of Freedom.
At a time when many young Russians waxed nostalgic for the iron fist of Josef Stalin, Bukovsky was a living role model to his native country’s new generation of dissenters. Political activist rock band Pussy Riot credited him as a major influence, one “undeterred by fear” of state retaliation.
May 14, 2019: Bukovsky's book Judgment in Moscow was released.
Hardcover, paperback and e-book versions available.
Amazon: Hardcover, Paperback, and Kindle
UK sales: Kindle and Paperback
Australia: Kindle and Paperback
Jay Nordlinger of National Review interviewed Bukovsky and reviewed the book:
Review: Bukovsky’s Judgment
Interview Part 1: ‘Not Suitable for Recruiting’
Interview Part 2: Echoing Words
Interview Part 3: Nazis and Communists
Interview Part 4: Heroes and Villains
To Build a Castle, Bukvosky's bestselling 1978 prison memoir, is now available for Kindle.
February 12, 2018: Bukovksy's trial on child pornography charges was stayed in Cambridge Crown Court.
Judge Hawkesworth told press: “I’m quite satisfied that due to the continued deterioration in his health… when it came to the moment whether Mr Bukovsky should or could give evidence we would be faced with a wholly impossible situation. It wouldn’t be fair to try the man in those circumstances."
The New York Times: Foes of Russia Say Child Pornography is Planted to Ruin Them
PRESS Archive
“What can you tell them in a skimpy leaflet, or even via all the radio stations of the Soviet Union? They know, my friend. They keep quiet because they know, not because they don’t know. Can you blame them?”
TRIAL
National Review - Did Britain fall into Putin's trap in prosecuting Bukovsky?
The Weekly Standard - Crown Prosecution Service's case against Bukovsky seems oddly lacking in skepticism.
The American Spectator - Is Bukovsky's case really against the Kremlin?
Current Events
Russian dissidents called mentally ill - 2007. The practice Bukovsky exposed has been revived.
Bukovsky on Brexit - 2016. Translation of an essay written after the UK's EU referendum for the Ukrainian publication Gordon.
Putin's system will collapse - 2014. Conversation with another former dissident and prisoner, Andrei Sannikov, about unrest in the former Soviet Union.
The Marxist-Leninist Roots of the European Union - 2013. Interview in Analysis & Review.
HISTORical
A Chronicle of Current Events
The influential 1968-1982 Moscow samizdat journal of dissent, which has been translated to English and put online.
Complete archive of the Chronicle's Bukovsky entries
Front page of The New York Times, December 18, 1976
The New York Times
Complete archive - More than 200 articles that mention Bukovsky, beginning in 1967.
Selected New York Times articles:
Soviet to Free Leading Dissident in Trade for Leading Communist
Gen. Svetlichny: 'We Will Let Him Rot in the Insane Asylum!'
Emigres' Letter Printed in Soviet, Draws Harsh Reply from Pravda
The Times (London)
First public reports of psychiatric dossiers on six dissidents which Bukovsky smuggled to the West.
The Observer
The New York Review of Books - 1970. "A Letter From Vladimir Bukovsky." Translation of an open letter in which Bukovsky recounts the repercussions in the USSR of the Post's previous article on him.
Chicago Tribune - 1972. "Soviet Union vs. Bukovsky -- The Trial of a Dissident." His trial in Moscow for passing documents from psychiatric prisons to foreign correspondents.
The Economist - 1989. "Better Red than Dead?" Bukovsky's persistent claim that the worldwide disarmament movement of the 80's was funded and orchestrated from the Soviet bloc.
Institute of Modern Russia - 2012. "A Life of Integrity," interview with Bukovsky for his 70th birthday.
Wikipedia - A 16-page, 6,000-word entry with a bibliography of Russian works and 150 footnote references.
Supporters of Vladimir Bukovsky - Links to relevant Russian-language articles.
FILMS
They Chose Freedom - 2005. A four part documentary on the Soviet dissident movement.
Russian/Chechnya - Voices of Dissent - 2006. Bukovsky explains how the Chechen invasion is the continuation of old policies that go back hundreds of years, using staged bombings to justify war.
Parallels, Events, People - 2014. A documentary on the dissident movement and its parallels to the 2011-13 protests in Russia.
The Soviet Story - 2008. A documentary sponsored by the European Parliament's UEN group that looks at collaboration between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union prior to World War II, and contrasts the difference between modern Germany and Russia's view of their own pasts - one shameful, one glorious.
1976. ABC Evening News reports Bukovsky's arrival in Switzerland, on his way to England.
2007. Bukovsky returns to Moscow, says Putin regime targeted Litvinenko and others for legalized murder.