How to Break Writers

Feinberg: I believe it would simplify the problem to state that the KGB orders experts to designate such and such a political prisoner a mental case.

Nadjarov: Of course. Besides, it is better not to touch on politics. Each of us has his own opinions in that area.

Feinberg: Let’s begin with the question of expert opinion. It’s common knowledge that in psychiatry diagnostic criteria are vague and diffuse. That’s how it happens that a doctor who is guided by the recognized principle of “doubt in favor of the patient” often certifies a man as sick who is in perfect mental health. The man is then forced to submit to treatment. The result of all this is that a man who has committed the same acts for which his comrades are sent to concentration camps for a longer or shorter period of time—a man who has committed the same acts for the same motives—is judged mentally ill and is sent to a spec...