The human spirit under tyranny: Isaiah Berlin's The Soviet Mind.(Literature)(Book Review)

IN 1940 ISAIAH BERLIN wrote to his father from New York. 'America," he said, "was a great big glaring sunlit extrovert over-articulated scene" and Americans were a "two-times-two equals four, sort of people, who want yes or no for an answer ..." What Berlin missed in America was, according to his biographer Michael Ignatieff, European "nuance". There were no mazes, nothing but flat clear vistas. Conversations with Americans were equally disappointing: "a total lack of salt, pepper, mustard".

All the more remarkable then, that an American, Strobe Talbott--with much "nuance" and picking his way with infinite tact through the "maze" of Berlin's hesitations--would be instrumental in convincing Berlin that his "scattered writings" on the Soviet Union should be brought together for a publication called The Soviet Mind." Russian Culture under Communism.

Talbott has himself written several books on the Soviet Union and first interviewed Berlin in the summer of 1968 when the tanks were grinding their way through Czechoslovakia. Henry Hardy was his partner in the convincing process. He is a fellow of Berlin's own Wolfson College at Oxford and one of Berlin's literary trustees, who has previously edited earlier collections of Berlin's writings. "I have long known that this book ought to exist," he says in his preface to The Soviet Mind.

Hardy had approached Berlin in 1991 after his Crooked Timber of Humanity was published. At first Berlin demurred, saying his writings were occasional, lightweight and somewhat obsolete. But Ignatieff describes them more correctly as "nothing less than a history of Russian culture in the first half of the twentieth century". Together Talbot and Hardy have done considerable justice to Berlin's insights, but first they had to overcome his reluctance to see them published after the collapse of communism. He thought that since the Soviet Union had "gone under", to contribute works "which danced upon its grave would be inopportune" and that publication ten or fifteen years hence might be more appropriate.

THE EVENTS that laid the groundwork for Berlin's visit--indeed his two visits--to the Soviet Union were astonishing enough in themselves. Guy Burgess, who Berlin had known since the early thirties, and had watched with a wary fascination as he dexterously swerved from one career path into another, visited Berlin "out of the blue" at All Souls in 1940 and suggested they go off to Russia together. As Ignatieff pointed out, Berlin "had no inkling of Burgess's deeper and darker involvements" and formed the impression that Burgess was travelling under the auspices of the Ministry of Information with the blessing of Harold Nicolson. Not so. When they disembarked at Quebec and made their way to New York (the plan was to enter Russia via Vladivostok) Burgess mysteriously claimed he had been recalled to London.

Berlin, who had tossed in his teaching job, in the hope of doing something--anything--for the war effort, was left floundering. He approached the Soviet embassy in Washington in the hope of securing a visa to continue his journey and engaged in some sharp banter with the Russian ambassador over lunch. Why, asked Berlin, had the Soviets occupied Riga (his birthplace) and snuffed out the independence of the Baltic republics? "New Deal for Latvia, New Deal for Estonia, New Deal for Lithuania," smirked the ambassador--but the visa was forthcoming. Mortifying then, for Berlin to discover that London had no knowledge of his mission and could see no useful function for him in Moscow; indeed the Foreign Office sent a chill note suggesting they had no desire to employ him in any capacity whatsoever.

Berlin was embarrassed to be in New York while the bombs were falling on London and he was homesick, but he landed on his feet in an astonishing fashion. His old friend Felix Frankfurter introduced him to key figures in Roosevelt's administration, and soon he was sending back knowledgeable and precise commentary on the American scene--so much so that the British embassy offered him a permanent job with the British Press Service in New York. After a brief and dangerous journey back to England he was back in New York in January 1941 assembling weekly reports for the Ministry of Information on American public opinion, specifically how the pendulum was--or was not--swinging from isolationism to involvement.