Anna Akhmatova (1889–1966)

Anna Akhmatova was one of the most beloved of Russian poet-wriiters although her work was condemned and censored by the Soviet authorities. Although she had visited the West as a young woman, Anna did not try to emigrate during war, revolution, or Stalin's Great Terror, but served as a witness to the atrocities committed around her. Several of her friends and her husband were sent to the gulag to die or into exile; her son Lev was repeatedly imprisoned.