Reminiscences of colleagues.

The memoirs of the Soviet physicist and Nobel Peace Prize-winning dissident who, at enormous personal cost, laid the foundations for the profound political changes sweeping the Soviet Union to this day. 32 pages of black-and-white photos. First time in paperback.

Andrei Sakharov holds an honored place in the pantheon of the world's greatest scientists, reformers, and champions of human rights. But his embrace of human rights did not come through a sudden conversion; he came to it in stages. Drawing from a 2014 Hoover Institution conference focused on Sakharov's life and principles, this book tells the compelling story of his metamorphosis from a distinguished physical scientist into a courageous, outspoken dissident humanitarian voice.His extraordinary life saw him go from playing the leading role in designing and building the most powerful thermonuclear weapon (the so-called hydrogen bomb) ever exploded to demanding an end to the testing of such weapons and their eventual elimination. The essays detail his transformation, as he appealed first to his scientific colleagues abroad and then to mankind at large, for solidarity in resolving the growing threats to human survival—many of which stemmed from science and technology. Ultimately, the distinguished contributors show how the work and thinking of this eminent Russian nuclear physicist and courageous human rights campaigner can help find solutions to the nuclear threats of today.

DIVAndrei Sakharov (1921–1989), a brilliant physicist and the principal designer of the Soviet hydrogen bomb, later became a human rights activist and—as a result—a source of profound irritation to the Kremlin. This book publishes for the first time ever KGB files on Sakharov that became available during Boris Yeltsin’s presidency. The documents reveal the untold story of KGB surveillance of Sakharov from 1968 until his death in 1989 and of the regime’s efforts to intimidate and silence him. The disturbing archival materials show the KGB to have had a profound lack of understanding of the spiritual and moral nature of the human rights movement and of Sakharov’s role as one of its leading figures. /div

Seemingly shy, Andrei Sakharov was in fact a man of three great passions. His passion for physics ultimately lead him to create the Soviet H-Bomb, making the USSR a super power. But he rejected all the position and prestige his inventions had brought him in the name of a greater passion — for justice. And yielding nothing to these two passions was his passion for human rights activist Elena Bonner, their love story one of the great romances of our time. This book tells the story of the man, his passions, and the time and place where they all played out. “As Richard Lourie’s new, subtle and revealing biography of Sakharov demonstrates... [Sakharov] ranks with Nelson Mandela as a person who helped guide his country to democracy, changing himself in the process. One of the strengths of Lourie’s biography is his description and analysis of how this transition occurred... a fascinating account of Sakharov... [Lourie’s] analysis of [Sakharov’s] complicated political journey seems authentic and immensely revealing.” — Loren Graham, The New York Times “A vivid portrait of [Sakharov,] this moral and intellectual giant... Lourie has written a highly intelligent and exceptionally readable book. He not only captures his protagonist admirably but exhibits a fine feel for the social and political backdrop as well as for the peculiar mixture of fearful servility and courageous generosity of the Russian people. Among other things, he vividly brings to life how the Communist regime constrained scientists, sometimes even arresting and murdering them, while those who survived persevered in their work to achieve remarkable results.” — Aleksa Djilas,Commentary Magazine “Lourie does full justice to a life that could not be more engrossing. The socially introverted son of Moscow intelligentsia, Andrei Sakharov became a star physics pupil, then chief architect of the Soviet Union’s first thermonuclear device, and later on a dissident and target of KGB ire — and finally the moral conscience of a democratically awakening Russia... The evolution from a politically passive scientist to a lonely figure holding sidewalk vigils outside kangaroo courtrooms is almost unfathomable for a non-Russian. Lourie, however, makes it comprehensible, not least by painting with an artist’s spare, deft strokes this transcendent figure into the history of his day.” — Robert Legvold, Foreign Affairs “Richard Lourie is ideally placed to write the first full biography of this remarkable man. He was able to interview Sakharov and many of his colleagues. He has translated Sakharov’s memoirs, and often uses direct speech drawn from them to take us behind the scenes without giving rise to the usual suspicion of novelistic invention. This makes for an engagingly readable book... Lourie’s appraisal of Sakharov as a man is scrupulously balanced, with as much emphasis on his obstinacy as on his compassion... The book conveys both the elation of scientific work, the intense love between Sakharov and his second wife, and the bewildering nature of human courage.” — Elaine Feinstein, The Telegraph “The inventor of the Soviet H-bomb, [Sakharov] was in the forefront of the post-war breakthrough in thermonuclear physics that led to the creation of atomic energy. Yet he also stood, heroically at times, in the vanguard of the movement for human rights in the Soviet Union. Richard Lourie tells both these stories in this first full-length biography of the physicist and dissident. Lourie has benefited from the recent publication of the KGB files on Sakharov. He also knew the man himself, whose Memoirs he helped to smuggle out of Russia to the West (where they were published in Lourie’s translation a year after Sakharov’s death in 1989). Sakharov’s widow, Elena Bonner, has helped Lourie’s research, which adds a welcome new perspective on the last 20 years of his eventful life, when husband and wife were subjected to a bullying campaign of threats and slander by the KGB in a vain attempt to silence them.” — Orlando Figes, The Telegraph “A solid factual and interpretive study... Sakharov is an important account of one scientist’s courage and his quest for a humane world at peace.” — Herbert Mitgang, Chicago Tribune “This first biography of the renowned physicist, Soviet dissident and Nobel Peace Prize winner weaves the details of Sakharov’s life together with the history of the Soviet Union, which barely outlasted him. Lourie... describes Sakharov’s upbringing in a liberal family and his rise through the Soviet science program during the 1930s and ‘40s. Lourie’s vivid accounts of Sakharov’s meetings with Stalin and KGB chief Beria, his role in the intelligentsia, his marriages and his cramped apartments offer a textured picture of Soviet life during the Cold War... Lourie’s intelligent, engaging biography will be appreciated by those interested in Russian and Cold War history.” — Publishers Weekly

A comprehensive account of Sakharov's life and intellectual development, focusing on his political thought and the effect his ideas had on Soviet society.

How did Andrei Sakharov, a theoretical physicist and the acknowledged father of the Soviet hydrogen bomb, become a human rights activist and the first Russian to win the Nobel Peace Prize? In his later years, Sakharov noted in his diary that he was "simply a man with an unusual fate." To understand this deceptively straightforward statement by an extraordinary man, The World of Andrei Sakharov, the first authoritative study of Andrei Sakharov as a scientist as well as a public figure, relies on previously inaccessible documents, recently declassified archives, and personal accounts by Sakharov's friends and colleagues to examine the real context of Sakharov's life. In the course of doing so, Gennady Gorelik answers a fascinating question, whether the Soviet hydrogen bomb was really fathered by Sakharov, or whether it was based on stolen American secrets. Gorelik concludes that while espionage did initiate the Soviet effort, the Russian hydrogen bomb was invented independently. Gorelik also elucidates the reasons that brought about the seemingly sudden transformation of the top-secret physicist into a public figure in 1968, when Sakharov's famous essay "Progress, Peaceful Coexistence, and Intellectual Freedom" was distributed in samizdat in the USSR and smuggled out to the West. Recently declassified documents show that Sakharov's metamorphosis was caused by professional concerns, particularly regarding the development of an anti-ballistic missile defense. An insider's view of how the upper echelons of the Soviet regime functioned had led Sakharov to the conclusion that the goals of peace, progress, and human rights were inextricably linked. His free thinking and free feeling were manifested in his hope that scientific thought and religious perception would find a profound synthesis in the future.