An Appeal to General Jaruzelski

To the Editors:

Following is the text of an open letter to the Polish prime minister, General Jaruzelski, that should be of interest to your readers.

Zygmunt Nagorski

Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies

New York City

The undersigned American writers, scientists, artists, and educators wish to present to you their deep concern, and astrong appeal for a speedy restoration of basic human rights in Poland. We specially request you to consider and to implement the immediate release of imprisoned writers, educators, labor leaders, students, and others. Poland, which in the last eighteen months fired people’s imagination all over the world, has become a symbol of repression, terror, and human fear.

Our appeal, Mr. Prime Minister, goes to the very core of your country’s future. We wish Poland to restore to herself the dignity that she deserves and the place in history that she earned herself throughout various stages of her fight for independence during this century. In order to do so, the martial law must be ended; in order to do so, the dignity of individuals should once again be respected.

We hope, Mr. Prime Minister, that you will not remain immune to our appeal which is only concerned with the future welfare of Poland and her people.

John Brademas, President, NYU; Robert Silvers, Co-Editor, The New York Review; James D. Wolfensohn, Chairman, Carnegie Hall; Donald Barthelme, writer; Frederick Seitz, President Emeritus, Rockefeller University; Barbara Tuchman, Pulitzer Prize winner, 1963, 1972, former President, Society of American Historians; Michael Walzer, educator, author; Irving Howe, author, historian, critic; Fritz Lipmann, Nobel Prize winner, Medicine, 1953; Joshua Lederberg, Nobel Prize winner, Medicine, 1958; Rene Dubos, Pulitzer Prize winner, 1969, bacteriologist, environmental scientist; Christian De Duve, Nobel Prize winner, Medicine, 1974; Isidore Rabi, Nobel Prize winner, Physics, 1946; Isaac Stern, violinist; Zubin Mehta, conductor; Itzhak Perlman, violinist; Daniel Barenboim, pianist, conductor; Susan Sontag, writer; Barbara Epstein, Co-Editor, The New York Review