Translation from the Russian text
Biography in Russian (pdf)
I was born on
21 May 1921. My father was a well-known teacher of physics and
the author of textbooks, exercise books and works of popular
science. I grew up in a large communal apartment where most of
the rooms were occupied by my family and relations and only a few
by outsiders. The house was pervaded by a strong traditional
family spirit - a vital enthusiasm for work and respect for
professional competence. Within the family we provided one
another with mutual support, just as we shared a love of
literature and science.
My father played the piano remarkably well, in particular Chopin,
Grieg, Beethoven and Scriabin. During the civil war he earned a
living by playing the accompaniment to silent films at the
cinema.
I am especially grateful for the memory of my grandmother, Maria
Petrovna, who was the family's good spirit. She died before the
war at the age of 79. My grandmother brought up six children and
when she was around 50 years old she taught herself English all
on her own. Right up to the time of her death she read English
works of fiction in the original. From when we were quite small
she read aloud to us, her grandchildren. I still have the most
vivid memory of her reading to us those evenings. It would be
Pushkin, Dickens, Marlowe or Beecher-Stowe, and in Holy Week, the
Gospel.
The influence of my home has meant a great deal to me,
particularly because I had my first lessons at home and later
experienced the greatest difficulty in adapting myself to my
classmates. I took my final school examination with distinction
in 1938 and at once began to study at the Faculty of Physics in
Moscow
University. Here too I passed my Finals with distinction, in
1942 when because of the war, we had been evacuated to
Ashkhabad.
In the summer and autumn of 1942 I lived for some weeks in Kovrov
where I had originally been sent to work after my graduation.
Later I worked as a lumberjack in a desolate rural settlement
near Melekess. My first bitter impressions of the life of the
workers and peasants in that very hard time are derived from
those days. In September 1942 I was sent to a large munitions
factory on the Volga where I worked as an engineer and inventor
right until 1945. At the factory I made a number of inventions in
the field of production control. But in 1944, while still
employed at the factory, I wrote some scientific articles on
theoretical physics and sent them to Moscow for appraisal and
comment. These first works were never published, but they gave me
the self-confidence so essential to every researcher.
In 1945 I began to read for my doctorate at the Lebedev
Institute, the department of physics in the Academy of Sciences
of the USSR. My teacher there was the great theoretical
physicist, Igor
Evgenyevich Tamm.
He influenced me enormously and later became a member of the
Academy of Sciences of the USSR and a winner of the Nobel Prize
for physics. In 1947 I defended my thesis on nuclear physics, and
in 1948 I was included in a group of research scientists whose
task was to develop nuclear weapons. The leader of this group was
I.E. Tamm.
For the next 20 years I worked under conditions of the highest
security and under great pressure, first in Moscow and
subsequently in a special secret research centre. At the time we
were all convinced that this work was of vital significance for
the balance of power in the world and we were fascinated by the
grandeur of the task. In the foreword to my book Sakharov
Speaks, as well as in My Country and the World, I have
already described the development of my socio-political views in
the period 1953-68 and the dramatic events which contributed to
or were the expression of this development. Between 1953 and 1962
much of what happened was connected with the development of
nuclear weapons and with the preparations for and realization of
the nuclear experiments. At the same time I was becoming ever
more conscious of the moral problems inherent in this work. In
and after 1964 when I began to concern myself with the biological
issues, and particularly from 1967 onwards, the extent of the
problems over which I felt uneasy increased to such a point that
in 1968 I felt a compelling urge to make my views public.
Thus it was that the article Progress, Peaceful Coexistence
and Intellectual Freedom came into being. In reality these
are the same themes which seven and a half years later were to
become the title of my Nobel Lecture ("Peace, Progress and Human
Rights"). I consider these themes to be fundamentally important
and closely interconnected. My public stand represented a turning
point for me and my entire future. The article very quickly
became known throughout the world. For a long time the Soviet
press contained no mention of the Progress, and later
references were either disapproving in the extreme or else
ironic. A great many critics, even if sympathetically disposed
towards me, regarded my reflections in this work as exceedingly
naive and speculative. Today, however, after eight intervening
years, it seems that much of what may be termed important both in
Soviet politics and in international politics is connected in one
way or another with these thoughts.
From 1970 onwards the defence of human rights and the defence of
the victims of political trials became all-important to me.
Together with (Valery) Chalidze and Tverdokhlebov, and later with
(Igor) Shafarevich and Podyapolski I shared in running the
Committee for Human Rights, thus making my position quite clear.
I feel bound to recall the fate of two of them. In April 1976
Andrei Tverdokhlebov was sentenced to five years exile for his
social work, and in March Grigori Podyapolski was lost to us
through his tragic premature death.
As early as 1950, Tamm and I were the joint originators of a
Soviet work on controlled thermonuclear reaction (the
thermonuclear reaction of hydrogen isotopes either for the
production of electrical energy or for the production of fuel for
nuclear reactors). Great advances have now been made in this
work. A year later, at my initiative, experiments were started on
the construction of implosive magnetic generators (devices by
which chemical or nuclear reactions are transformed into magnetic
field energy). In 1964 we attained a record with a magnetic field
of 25 million gauss.
From July 1968, when my article was published abroad, I was
removed from top-secret work and "relieved" of my privileges in
the Soviet "Nomenclatura" (the privileged class at the top of the
system). Since the summer of 1969 I have again been working at
the Lebedev Institute where I studied, as an assistant, for my
doctorate from 1945 to 1947 and began my scientific work. My
present work concerns the problems connected with the theory of
elementary particles, the theory of gravitation and cosmology and
I shall be glad if I can manage to make some contribution to
these important branches of science.
Nevertheless, it is the social issues which unremittingly demand
that I make a responsible personal effort and which also lay
increasing claims on my physical and mental powers. For me, the
moral difficulties lie in the continual pressure brought to bear
on my friends and immediate family, pressure which is not
directed against me personally but which at the same time is all
around me. I have written about this on many occasions but, sad
to report, all that I said before applies equally today. I am no
professional politician - which is perhaps why I am continually
obsessed by the question as to the purpose served by the work
done by my friends and myself, as well as its final result. I
tend to believe that only moral criteria, coupled with mental
objectivity, can serve as a sort of compass in the cross-currents
of these complex problems.
I have stated in writing many times already that I intend to
refrain from making any concrete political prognoses. There is a
large measure of tragedy in my life at present. The sentences
lately passed on my close friends - Sergei Kovalev (who just
exactly at the time of the Nobel Prize ceremony was sentenced to
seven years' imprisonment and three years' exile) and Andrei
Tverdokhlebov - represent the clearest and most unequivocal
evidence of this. Yet, even so, both now and for always, I intend
to hold fast to my belief in the hidden strength of the human
spirit.
After receiving the prize, Sakharov continued to work for human rights and to make statements to the West through Western correspondents in Moscow. Early in 1980, after he had denounced the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, he was exiled to Gorky. In 1984, Elena Bonner joined him, also under sentence of exile. Isolated from family and friends, they continued to be persecuted by the KGB. Sakharov resorted to hunger strikes to secure medical treatment for Bonner, who was finally given permission to leave the Soviet Union for heart surgery in 1985. After Mikhail Gorbachev came to power with a policy of liberalisation, they were freed and allowed to return to Moscow in 1986. Despite the measure of freedom now possible, which enabled him to take up a political role as an elected member of the Congress of the People's Deputies, Sakharov was critical of Gorbachev, insisting that the reforms should go much further. He died in Moscow on December 14, 1989.
Selected Bibliography
By Sakharov
Alarm and Hope. Edited by E. Yankelevich and Alfred
Friendly, Jr. New York: Knopf, 1978. (Public statements and
writings, 1976-78.)
Memoirs. New York: Knopf. 1990. (The first volume,
covering the years through 1986. With documentary appendices and
complete bibliography in English of his important essays,
statements, and appeals.)
Moscow and Beyond. New York: Knopf, 1990. (Second volume
of memoirs, covering the years 1986-1989.)
My Country and the World. New York: Knopf, 1976. (The
second important essay to be published in the West.)
Progress, Coexistence, and Intellectual Freedom. New York:
Norton, 1968. (The famous "Manifesto". Also referred to as
Thoughts on Progress, Coexistence and Intellectual
Freedom.)
Sakharov Speaks. Edited by Harrison E. Salisbury. New
York: Knopf, 1974. (Includes the "Manifesto".)
Other Sources
Bonner, Elena. Alone Together. New York: Knopf, 1986.
(Memoirs of the years of exile in Gorky by Sakharov's wife.
Includes Sakharov's documents.)
From Nobel Lectures, Peace 1971-1980, Editor-in-Charge Tore Frängsmyr, Editor Irwin Abrams, World Scientific Publishing Co., Singapore, 1997
This autobiography/biography was written at the time of the award and first published in the book series Les Prix Nobel. It was later edited and republished in Nobel Lectures. To cite this document, always state the source as shown above.
For more updated biographical information, see: Sakharov, Andrei, Memoirs. Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1990.
Copyright © The Nobel Foundation 1975
Andrei Sakharov
