Brodsky's sentence was commuted in 1965 after protests by prominent Soviet and foreign cultural figures (see - Alexandra Raskina. "Frida Vigdorova's Transcript of Joseph Brodsky's Trial: Myths and Reality", Journal of Modern Russian History and Historiography, 7 (2014), 144 -- 180), including Evgeny Evtushenko, Dmitri Shostakovich, and Jean-Paul Sartre as well as Akhmatova. Brodsky became a cause célèbre in the West also, when a secret transcription of trial minutes was smuggled out of the country, making him a symbol of artistic resistance in a totalitarian society, much like his mentor, Akhmatova.