When the idea of writing this book was conceived in the mid-1960s, Soviet literature appeared to be on the upswing. A new, bold generation of poets and prose writers, reinforced by an older generation recently released from decades of frustration, was in the process of introducing a variety of fresh topics, ideas, and styles into a literature that had been virtually moribund. The present book, then, was planned as the chronicle and analysis of a literary renaissance. The events and developments of the ensuing decade, however, have been so disappointing that the process can now be best described as a renaissance in reverse. What began as a great burst of liberated creative energy subsided into something fragmented, depressed, and lifeless.

There is reason to hope that the setback is only temporary. For one thing, a great amount of literary talent remains in the Soviet Union – most of it now silent, timid, or underground, but nevertheless alive. For another, the recent emigration of many of Russia's most powerful and accomplished writers has at least preserved their lives, their opportunities to publish and, in a limited way, to continue communicating with the countrymen they left behind. In addition, although the literary horizon has darkened profoundly, the conditions under which the Soviet literary world must live are still far better than they were under Stalin. Finally, the solid accomplishments of many Soviet writers in the past twenty years, and the general learning process that these accomplishments involved, cannot be easily erased.

It must be remembered that in the early 1950s Soviet literature was constricted by an extremely narrow conception of human nature, human affairs, and historical processes, and was governed ultimately by the whim of the world's most powerful dictator.