The Sakharov File

School Library Journal

Gr 7 Up Good biographers place thier subjects in the context of their time and place in order for readers to make the most complete appraisal possible. The problem with LeVert's biography of Soviet dissident, scientist, and Nobel Peace Prize winner Andrei Sakharov is that she spends more time with the context than with the subject. She becomes so bogged down in attempting to explain Marxism, the Russian Revolution, Stalin's repressive decades, and the effects of later leaders Khrushchev and Brezhnev to American readers that little in the way of background information on Sakharov's formative years or even his career work comes through in this portrait. Only near the end of the book, when the author recounts Sakharov's hunger strikes in support of his wife and his stepson's fiancee, do readers begin to see the courage and passion of conviction that have made Sakharov an international figure of renown. It is also worth mentioning that the text is not without striking error: Jimmy Carter did not receive the Nobel Peace Prize as the author claims. LeVert quotes liberally from Hedrich Smith's The Russians (Times, 1983), a book to which competent readers should be directed instead of this one. Andrei Sakharov is one of the most remarkable men of our age. It is unfortunate that he is not better served in this biography. Jerry Flack, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs