Soviet Magazine Called ‘Kind of Scum’ : Pravda Article Attacks Pro-Gorbachev Editor

A long-simmering controversy surrounding an editor at the forefront of President Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s glasnost policy took an ominous turn Wednesday when the Communist Party newspaper Pravda published a sharp attack on the editor by an influential group of conservative writers.

Such cultural battles have extraordinary political significance in countries like the Soviet Union, where rulers still rely more on ideology than on a public mandate for their legitimacy. And while the top Soviet political leaders have carefully steered clear of this fracas, publication of an open letter in the country’s most important newspaper appears to have increased the pressure for them to weigh in on one side or the other.

While the letter did not name its target, it was clearly aimed at Vitaly A. Korotich, a Ukrainian poet who nearly three years ago took over as editor of a nondescript magazine called Ogonyok (Little Flame) and turned it into a leading force for liberalization.

‘Distort History’

But to the six writers and a like-minded film director who wrote the letter to Pravda, Ogonyok represents “a kind of scum . . . on the crest of the powerful wave of rejuvenation.” The group accused the weekly of printing unsubstantiated articles that “distort history on an unprecedented scale . . . reassess people’s social achievements and vulgarize cultural values.”

The letter writers, all of whom are considered key cultural conservatives, complained that “the magazine has assumed the role of an ultimate authority in all spheres of public life, politics, economics, culture and morals.” And in perhaps their most serious accusation, they added, “These activities have a precisely formulated goal: to humiliate, to slander, to discredit.”

Among the letter’s signatories are the Siberian writer Valentin Rasputin and Sergei Bondarchuk, a film director probably best known for his “War and Peace.”

Others Opposed

While they were not signatories, other key cultural conservatives said to be trying to force Korotich out of his post are Sergei Mikhailkov, head of the Russian Writers Union; Yuri Bondarev, a politically powerful novelist and Mikhailkov’s deputy, and Anatoly Ivanov, editor of the rightist literary magazine Molodaya Gvardia (Young Guard).

Earlier this month, members of the anti-Semitic, right-wing group called Pamyat violently disrupted a meeting being held to nominate Korotich for a seat in the next Soviet legislature.

“Korotich, you Jew, give back your silver coins,” the Pamyat members shouted. Korotich is not Jewish, but Russian anti-Semites frequently use the term referring to anyone considered liberal or “cosmopolitan.”

The Pravda attack was in direct response to an open letter published in Ogonyok’s first edition of 1989, in which the then-chief editor of Literaturnaya Rossiya (Russian Literature), the official publication of the Russian Writers Union, accused his superior, Bondarev, of working against Gorbachev’s policy of perestroika, or the “restructuring” of Soviet society. “You need the paper as your own mouthpiece, promoting your--let’s put it mildly--not very progressive ideas, which would protect you and your group from criticism and which would expose and soil your enemies,” wrote journalist Mikhail Kolosov.

By the next issue of Literaturnaya Rossiya, the 65-year-old Kolosov’s name had disappeared from the masthead. And in response to a query from The Times on Wednesday, a spokesman for the publication said he “has been retired.”

“Haven’t we lost our dignity and public conscience if we can permit such humiliation and dishonor of the famous artist without any cause?” the Pravda letter asked rhetorically about the attack on Bondarev.

Critical of Perestroika

Bondarev has been publicly critical of Gorbachev’s policies, most notably during last summer’s party conference here, when he compared perestroika to an airplane that had taken off without any clear destination.

Korotich, who is said to be abroad and unavailable for comment Wednesday, is considered one of Gorbachev’s closest allies.

Still, the Soviet leader has apparently been trying to stay out of the cultural fray while he deals with a potentially even more serious backlash among ordinary Soviet citizens who have so far seen mostly empty store shelves in the wake of his “restructuring.”

When Korotich was attacked last week at a meeting attended by a group of leading Soviet intellectuals, Gorbachev at one point reportedly said, “Why don’t our writers adopt the principle of unilateral disarmament?”

But the Pravda letter appears to represent instead a new phase of the cultural arms race.