LEILA FADEL, HOST:
You probably know Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich from images of him in a glass cage in a Russian court two years ago. At the time, the Russian American journalist was charged with espionage for doing his job. And his case drew international outcry. As soon as he was arrested, he says he knew he would be used as a political bargaining chip for prisoner swaps. For that reason, his treatment was far less brutal than others.
EVAN GERSHKOVICH: Viktoria Roshchyna (ph), a Ukrainian journalist who got taken captive around the same period, she ended up being killed in prison and returned in a body bag without her internal organs, so her parents don't know what happened to her. So we're treated very, very, very differently, and that also gives away to me what kind of case this is.
FADEL: His arrest came over a year after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine as the Kremlin was stripping press freedoms, and as Gershkovich's life he'd built in Russia started to change. A new censorship law was passed and many of his Russian friends were forced into exile. Through all of it, he still felt he could generally work safely as an American journalist. Then that changed. What kept him sane for those 16 months in Russian prison was doing what he does as a journalist - listening, watching and writing.
GERSHKOVICH: You can't change the fact that you're there. And if you can accept that, then you might as well turn your reporter's eye towards what's interesting.
FADEL: The journals he kept in prison are the backbone of Gershkovich's memoir, "This Cursed Beautiful Land: A Russian-American Story."
After a while in prison, you start to think of this little, tiny cell that you share with another adult man as home. What was the moment where you realized, oh, I'm starting to at least get used to, or maybe even think of this place as where I live now?
GERSHKOVICH: Insanely enough, pretty quickly.
FADEL: Wow.
GERSHKOVICH: Like, pretty much right away because what I was really surprised about is that first day, I'm already automatically complying to any sort of command. To face a wall if I'm moving somewhere, to keep my hands behind my back.
FADEL: Yeah.
GERSHKOVICH: It's not something I even give second thought. So then the home around me - because that is your home, that's where you spend all your time - suddenly starts also feeling like home. But I think that's also a big coping mechanism because if you think of your actual home and of freedom, that'll drive you completely insane.
FADEL: But I wondered, you know, just as a journalist who has always spent your time removed, watching, observing, now becoming incredibly famous because you've been arrested and the world is wondering, will there be justice for you? Will you be released? What was that like to be the story?
GERSHKOVICH: Really surreal would be one way of describing it.
FADEL: Yeah.
GERSHKOVICH: And one thing about being a reporter is you're sort of always pulling yourself kind of away from a situation.
FADEL: Yeah.
GERSHKOVICH: Like a sort of emotional remove when you're reporting on horrific events. And I kind of did that with myself, too. Sort of like watching myself, because it's sort of, like, my Russian side that's going through this 'cause it's all in Russian. You know, I see - yeah, I see myself on TV. But I see Evan.
(LAUGHTER)
GERSHKOVICH: And so it's this sort of, like, I'm observing him - this guy - as much as anybody else is, until right before when I find out that I'm going to be swapped. And I'm not sure if I'm ready...
FADEL: Yeah.
GERSHKOVICH: ...For it yet. And I think one of the things I was thinking about was, what's it going to be like to step out into the world to now be observed by other people?
FADEL: When you are convicted and you know the swap is about to happen, walk me through what was going through your head. Especially, like, when they come to get you. So you're flown back to Moscow, and they come to get you in Moscow, and you think, OK, this might be it?
GERSHKOVICH: In Russia, they're really, really open about the fact that they convict you, and then they swap you. And so what surprised me, I guess, was when I heard the actual conviction, was a kind of burst of anger and deep sadness at the same time, because I didn't do it. And I'm a journalist. And they've set up this whole charade. And so there's this sort of, you know, burst of anger, I can't believe you guys really went through this. And sadness that it's possible.
FADEL: You don't cry that entire time that you're...
GERSHKOVICH: Right.
FADEL: ...Detained. And the first time you cry, really, is after you have been able to hug your family, your loved ones. Why then, in the moments when you're finally free, are you feeling these emotions?
GERSHKOVICH: It was a decision both conscious and unconscious at the same time. The moment that it happened, the first time the tears came, were in the - my second night. I'm in a hotel room. And in prison, we always wore flip-flops. So you're trying to stay clean as much as you can. So flip-flops...
FADEL: Yeah.
GERSHKOVICH: ...Are just this sort of habit. And I got up to go to the bathroom, tried to put my slippers on. And then the next thing I know is I'm crying. I think that's the realization of that had been home. So in the moment, if it's a coping mechanism and it's normal, it's suddenly the weight of what that means. You know what that means to have your freedom taken away from you all kind of comes crashing down, because I hadn't let myself truly try to reason with it up until that point.
FADEL: Has it been hard to readjust to life?
GERSHKOVICH: I wasn't really ready for this kind of - yeah, this rush of emotion that I had kept out, the panic attacks that came with it, the inability to sleep because of being overwhelmed. And then, OK, fine. You get over all that. I did my therapy. But then the months go by, and it's sort of numbness. And then also just sort of, like, getting used to how time moves again because time moves differently in prison. Getting used to a feeling of normality, because it's not like normal life. Everything's always happy and great.
FADEL: Right.
GERSHKOVICH: And so remembering what that feels like. What Monday morning feels like...
(LAUGHTER)
GERSHKOVICH: ...When you're going to work. What Sunday night sometimes feels like.
FADEL: The last thing you do before you leave prison is you write a letter to Putin...
GERSHKOVICH: Right.
FADEL: ...Asking for an interview. I'm curious.
GERSHKOVICH: Right.
FADEL: Did you ever hear anything about that (laughter)?
GERSHKOVICH: They said no. It was...
FADEL: I mean, come on.
GERSHKOVICH: And it would - they did say no. They said it's not the right moment. I thought, you know, asking for the interview, knowing that they weren't going to grant an interview, you know. It was a sort of way of signaling, hey, I am a reporter.
FADEL: Yeah.
GERSHKOVICH: I've always been a reporter. I'm still going to be a reporter. You can't take that away from me. And that's also why I wanted to get back to reporting, because I always felt like if I suddenly go and become somebody else now, then they won. And so I don't know if that sounds rational to most other people, but it does to me.
FADEL: Evan Gershkovich is a journalist with The Wall Street Journal and is the author of "This Cursed Beautiful Land." Congratulations on your book. And thank you for being here.
GERSHKOVICH: Thank you and thank you so much.
(SOUNDBITE OF PHILIP GLASS & PAUL LEONARD-MORGAN'S "TALES FROM THE LOOP") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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