The World: THE FATE OF FAMILIES

Late last week a brown Volvo rolled through the snowy streets of a Vermont ski village and stopped in front of a restaurant, where TIME Correspondent Marlin Levin was waiting. A hazel-eyed woman got out and greeted Levin with a manuscript. She was Natalya Solzhenitsyna, 37, wife of the famed Russian author and exiled dissident, Alexander Solzhenitsyn. With their three children (ages 6, 4 and 3) and her 14-year-old son, the Solzhenitsyns now live and work in Vermont. At TIME'S request, Mrs. Solzhenitsyna wrote about the families of Soviet dissidents and what can be done to help them. Here are her...