From the Publisher

By Robert L. Miller

Every so often, a story is so important, so dramatic, that TIME devotes a special issue to the subject. Such is the case this week as we explore how Mikhail Gorbachev has transformed the Soviet Union -- and how much remains to be done. Led by Moscow bureau chief John Kohan, eleven reporters and five photographers spent four months crisscrossing the country in pursuit of their stories. "Wherever we went, glasnost opened doors for us," says Kohan. "There are opportunities for journalists that would have been unthinkable a few years ago."

What also distinguishes this issue is the unprecedented involvement of Soviet journalists and writers. We asked Vitali Korotich, editor of Ogonyok, a leading light of glasnost, to write about the pitfalls of the new Soviet journalism. Mikhail Zhvanetsky, one the country's most popular and outspoken comedians, penned a monologue for Show Business. Yuri Shchekochikhin, who works for Literaturnaya Gazeta, co-wrote a piece examining perestroika in the provinces. The Books section features an excerpt from The Place of the Skull, the latest novel by one of Gorbachev's favorite authors, Chingiz Aitmatov. Andrei Sinyavsky, an emigre writer who spent almost six years in a Soviet labor camp, contributed an essay reflecting on whether he would move back to Gorbachev's U.S.S.R.

Vsevolod Marinov of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences organized the most extensive Soviet poll ever conducted for a U.S. magazine. Since telephone surveys are relatively new in the Soviet Union, respondents were given a number to call to verify that those asking the questions were legitimate pollsters. "We received only about a dozen call-backs," says Marinov. "Some of them assumed we were officials who could help them with their problems. One woman even wanted her leaking radiator fixed."

During a session with Boris Yeltsin, the party-boss-turned-populist, photographer Ted Thai found it impossible to get him to smile. "So I went over and tugged on his cheek to show him what I meant," Thai recalls. The tactic may have been unorthodox, but Yeltsin is hardly the orthodox Soviet politician.