Mark Twain and the Russians: An Exchange of Views (An American Century Special)

32 pp. "In the fall of 1959 Charles Neider, editor of The Autobiography of Mark Twain, and Yan Bereznitsky, critic for the Moscow Literary Gazette, official organ of the Union of Soviet Writers, locked horns in a history-making literary debate. Bereznitsky charged that Neider had omitted from his book Mark Twain's caustic observations on American social and political life, and that the omissions were part of a literary self-censorship meekly accepted by American critics... Through Premier Khrushchev's intervention Neider's reply was published in full in the Literary Gazette, and he thus became the first American writer to be given an opportunity to air his views, uncensored, in a Soviet publication. This booklet presents the complete text of the exchange of letters which made front-page news throughout the country. It contains Bereznitsky's long rejoinder to Neider's letter and Neider's final rebuttal, which was not printed in the Literary Gazette."