La Comes e il caso Sinjavski-Daniel’. La crisi della diplomazia culturale tra Italia e Urss nel 1966

This article examines the relations between the European Community of Writers (Comes) and the Soviet authorities during the Sinjavsky-Daniel trial. The defense of dissident writers by the Western cultural world represents the most important attempt to maintain a collaboration with the Soviet writers that had grown during the Chrushchev thaw. The analysis of the 1966 crisis is conducted through documents from the Vigorelli archive and focuses on the breakdown of relations that marked the decline of the role played by the Comes in setting up a special dialogue with Soviet literary establishment.