Who is Solzhenitsyn's dissident heir?
Brian Cullen 12:42pm
Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the great Russian dissident, has died at the age of 89. Solzhenitsyn gave a face – and a powerful voice – to the victims of Soviet authoritarianism, through books such as A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and The Gulag Archipelago. His efforts earned him the Nobel Prize for literature in 1970.
Solzhenitsyn revealed just how terrible the regime was that the West faced in the Cold War. But who – if anyone – is highlighting the evils of the 21st Century world with such clarity and force? Any ideas, CoffeeHousers?
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M Forward
August 4th, 2008 1:11pm Report this commentChristopher Booker.
Sniper
August 4th, 2008 1:26pm Report this commentNot Michael Gove.
seb
August 4th, 2008 1:42pm Report this commentMany writers and journalists strive to draw the world's attention to the hideous evils of the 21st century. Alas, even more writers and journalists strive to convince their readers that we need to appease the new century's evil-doers and to lend their evil ideas a spurious respectability.
Ted Tedford
August 4th, 2008 1:54pm Report this commentAn obvious choice is Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
Guy Incognito
August 4th, 2008 1:58pm Report this commentGeorge Clooney, for exposing the censorship and oppression of free speech in American society, backed by nothing more than a multi-million-dollar budget, major Hollywood studios, nationwide theatre releases and sympathetic media interviews.
burma toad
August 4th, 2008 2:16pm Report this commentAyaan Hirsi Ali is not an obvious choice is, she is THE obvious choice. And unlike Solzhenitsyn she is actually on the side of modernity, choice and pluralism.
John Lea
August 4th, 2008 3:00pm Report this commentJordan (a.k.a. Katie Pryce).
William Norton
August 4th, 2008 3:20pm Report this commentNot sure about dissidence, but Solzhenitsyn's dissolute heir is, of course, Paul Staines.
Ray
August 4th, 2008 3:33pm Report this commentIf by "Solzhenitsyn's heir" you mean someone who was cast into outer darkness bearing the scars of having battled against a pernicious evil, then I would like to nominate RAY HONEYFORD - the Bradford headmaster whose prophetic warnings about multiculturalism during the 1980s were ridiculed and ignored, only to be eventually dusted off and presented as self-evident wisdom by the very same politicians and commentators who once branded him a 'racist' and hounded him from his job.
Max Kaye
August 4th, 2008 4:34pm Report this commentI also support the 'nomination' of Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
David Lindsay
August 4th, 2008 5:03pm Report this commentWhoever takes up his criticism of the West, which is still timely, whereas of course the USSR is no more.
See http://cusack.norumbega.co.uk/2008/08/03/alexander-solzhenitsyn/, for a start.
Michael St George
August 4th, 2008 5:54pm Report this commentPeter Hitchens
Otepoti
August 4th, 2008 8:16pm Report this commentI'm going for Mark Steyn and the other Canadian bloggers currently being persecuted for free speech by the pernicious Canadian Human Rights Commissions in conjuction with the Canadian Islamic Congress.
Mike A
August 4th, 2008 11:12pm Report this commentThe comment at 3:33 is worth noting.
Someone called 'Ray' nominated someone called "RAY HONEYFORD".
Just saying.
prinkipo71
August 5th, 2008 9:04am Report this commenteduard limonov of course
seb
August 5th, 2008 3:25pm Report this commentI hope there's time for this. Is the Eduard Limonov in prinkipo71's comment the same man as the odious fascist Russian pamphleteer and 'writer' called Eduard Limonov? If so, contributors might remember his appearance on the national news during the siege of Sarajevo. Mr. Limonov was lending his assistance to a band of drunken Serb thugs who had camped out on hills above the city and were firing heavy caliber machine gun bullets at the Sarajevan civilians below. How amusing was that for Mr. Limonov and, obviously, his humanist fan, Mr. Prinkipo?
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