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"In The War" and Other Stories by Vasily
Grossman
Just published by SovLit.com Books, this newly translated collection of stories clearly demonstrates that Soviet author Vasily Grossman was not merely a "war" writer, but a true universalist in the great Russian tradition. The stories in the collection, spanning nearly 30 years of the author's career, include: "A Tale About Happiness", "A Small Life", "In the War", "In the Country", "The Resident", "Dog", "From the Window of a Bus", and "An Autumn Storm". Also included is an afterword by translator Andrew Glikin-Gusinky, winner of Columbia University's Pushkin Prize for Translation. Click here to order "In the War" and Other Stories by Vasily Grossman. 
Boris Pasternak:A Tale of Two Telegrams On 23 October 1958, Boris Pasternak was awarded the Nobel Prize "for his important achievement both in contemporary lyrical poetry and in the field of the great Russia epic tradition." Pasternak was pleased and proud to accept the award; others in Soviet society, however, did not see him as deserving of such an honor, calling him instead a traitor, philistine, and slanderer. To read how this Nobel Prize was both accepted and rejected in telegrams, Click Here. 
The Forty-First by
Lavrenyov, Boris
(1924).
A female sniper with Red partisans misses her 41st vicitim (a White officer), then winds up stranded with him on a desert island, where they fall in love. However, the White's essentially selfish, bourgeois nature becomes apparent and she shoots him, fulfilling her mission and her class destiny
.... (more)
Alone by Aleshin, Samuil
(1956).
An adulterous relationship breaks up two happy marriages.
The adandoned spouses struggle to hold onto their wayward partners. The adulterers try to quash their impulses, but in the end they must be honest to themselves and to others by admitting their love. The Party tries to intervene, but is rebuffed. Who is to blame? Is it right to live a lie in order to preserve social propriety? Is it right to tell the truth when it only does harm to the blameless? What to do when duty is the same as misery? Is it ever too late for happiness? No black-and-white answers are offered to these questions--an ambiguity made possible by the conditions of The Thaw. But the author makes it clear that an honest woman, thus abandoned, bears no shame and should continue to hold her head high. Every human being retains his or her individual worth. Science teaches us, "In life, in man, everything is individual."
(more)
Immortality by Bubennov, Mikhail (1940). The Whites operate a "death barge", full of prisoners--Bolsheviks and ordinary peasants--who are hauled out one by one to be shot or hung. The captives attempt a rebellion, partisans attempt a rescue, and everyone nearly drowns in a storm. After capturing Kazan, the Red Army finally shows up to liberate the barge.(more) Locusts by Budantsev, Sergei (1927). A remote area of southern Azerbaijan is threatened with an attack of ravenous locusts. Swindlers and saboteurs--both in and out of official positions--defraud the government, leaving the region without resources or equipment with which to battle the locusts. Natural disaster ensues, followed by arrests and trials. (more) White Guard by Bulgakov, Mikhail (1924). A family of White Guardists and their friends are forced to accept defeat as their side loses to Petlyura's Ukrainian nationalists in Kiev in December 1918. (more) 
Not By Bread Alone by Dudintsev, Vladimir (1956). An inventor struggles against the invisible empire of bureaucracy and self-servers in a courageous attempt to advance the Soviet pipe industry. (more)
The Thaw by Ehrenburg, Ilya (1954). The novel which gave its name to an entire era of Soviet history, consisting mainly of interior monologues of a wide range of characters who are living inner personal lives at odds with their outer, public lives. Others struggle to keep love out of their souls because it conflicts with their duties to the factory and to the Party. A talented artist squanders his talent for the sake of glory and material success. But as winter passes and the spring thaw comes, a change is beginning--loves and childlike exuberances are blossoming out into the open. (more)The Rout by Fadeev, Aleksandr (1927). Red Army partisans flee from Cossacks and Japanese interventionists in Russia's Far East. (more)
Cities and Years by Fedin, Konstantin (1924). A spineless Russian intellectual is interred in Germany at the start of World War I. After the war, he fails to find his place in Revolutionary society. He betrays his love and helps a counterrevolutionary escape Soviet justice.... (more) Chapaev by Furmanov, Dmitri (1923). The charismatic Red Army commander Chapaev, along with his faithful political commisar, Klichkov, fights a never-ending battle against Kolchak, Cossacks, and other enemies of Communism. But in the end, he gets caught with his pants down. .... (more) Cement by Gladkov, Fyodor (1924). True Communists fight White Guards, bandits, lust and corruption as they struggle to bring a cement factory and the Soviet economy back to life in post-Civil War days. .... (more) Fat-Faced Passions by Gorky, Maksim (1917). A kvas-seller meets an abused young woman and her 12-year-old crippled son, who have been driven into grinding poverty. Despite the hopelessness of their situation and the alcoholism of his mother, the boy--who keeps a menagarie of cockroaches and other bugs--holds onto his dreams of a brighter future.... (more)
Those Who Seek by Granin, Daniil (1955). A scientist with a new idea, struggles to invent a device which will be of great benefit to the Soviet electrical industry.
Bureaucrats and established scientists at first try to steal the invention. When this fails, feeling their position and privilege threatened, they begin falsifying their own data and whip up a 1930s-style slander campaign against the young scientist, including charges of deviation from Marxism-Leninism. They attempt to manipulate Party meetings and stifle open discussion in order to advance their own careers. However, the falsity is eventually revealed, the rank-and-file demand the truth, and the neer-do-wells receive their comeuppance. In another Thaw-era touch, unconventional love is rehabilitated, i.e., the young scientist has an adulterous relationship and lives to tell about it. (more)THE EMBEZZLERS by Kataev, Valentin (1926) The accidental embezzlement of 12,000 rubles leads to a merry romp through the excesses of NEP-era Moscow, Leningrad, and the provinces. Champange, vodka, and dancing Germans abound. The pleasant company of former princesses and countesses is sought out-- and can be had for 100 rubles. The deceased emperor Nikolai II makes a comeback, but soon regrets it as he gets involved in a brawl and has a third of his beard ripped out. (more)
The Tanker Derbent by Krymov, Yuri S. (1938). The undisciplined and uncaring crew of an oil tanker gets swept up in the excitement of the Stakhanovite movement and completely transform themselves. A daring rescue on the high seas is featured, and the sanctity of marriage is upheld.... (more) The Forty-First by Lavrenyov, Boris (1924). A female sniper with Red partisans misses her 41st vicitim (a White officer), then winds up stranded with him on a desert island, where they fall in love. However, the White's essentially selfish, bourgeois nature becomes apparent and she shoots him, fulfilling her mission and her class destiny .... (more) The Week by Libedinsky, Yuri (1922). A peasant revolt rips through a remote town in the Urals. It is eventually put down, but not before the leading local Communists are brutally murdered. Frank portrayal of the hostility of the peasants to Soviet power and of many of the Party's failings .... (more) Siberia by Markov, Georgi (1973). A sweeping epic of love, revolution, and nature set in snow-swept Siberia. Bolsheviks, kulaks, Social Revolutionaries, honest hard-working peasants, and giant fish-creatures of legend all clash as tsarism crumbles. .... (more) The Bedbug by Mayakovsky, Vladimir (1929). A philistine from the NEP era gets frozen and is revived fifty years later in 1979. The moderns at first mistake him for an honest worker, but then correctly identify him as a bourgeoisus vulgaris, a blood-sucking insect similar to, but more dangerous than, the bedbug. He is put on display in a cage equipped with special filters to trap all the dirty words. .... (more) I Want To Go Home by Mikhalkov, Sergei (1948). In post-war Germany, the evil, murdering British keep displaced Soviet children captive, planning to turn them into wage slaves and spies. Honest Germans, driven into poverty and despair by the bullying, land-grabbing, greedy Americans, flee to freedom in the Soviet sector. .... (more) Marya the Bolshevik by Neverov, Aleksandr (1926). Women's liberation comes to a post-revolutionary Russian village. .... (more) TASHKENT, CITY OF BREAD by Neverov, Aleksandr (1923) A young boy sets out on a harrowing journey from his remote village to Tashkent, hoping to find grain for his starving family. Along the way he faces death and despair. But amid the cruelty he also finds friendship and kindness. He eventually returns home to the sad news that most of his family is dead. He is able to look past the tragedy, however, and confidently pledges to build everything anew. (more) Envy by Olesha, Yuri (1927). A successful Soviet food industry wizard gives shelter to an aimless drifter. The drifter comes to envy his host and, with the aid of his host's brother, plots a "conspiracy of feelings" against the new era. The plotters plan on using an "Ophelia machine" to annihilate their enemies. (more) Three Fat Men by Olesha, Yuri (1924). A fantastic fairy tale of revolution. A tightrope walker, balloons, very large pastries and a brave little girl help topple the dictatorship of three very fat men. (more)
Happiness by Pavlenko, Pyotr (1947). A war veteran comes to the devastated Crimea, hoping for a quiet and peaceful life. Instead, he finds happiness working to rebuild the smashed economy. He also plays a part in the Yalta Conference. Churchill is a fat, drunken pig. U.S. Army officers are more interested in selling soap than in defeating the enemy. Stalin Prize winner, 1947. (more) The Volga Falls To The Caspian Sea by Pilnyak, Boris (1931). Sabotage and betrayal on the construction site as true communists struggle to alter nature and establish a new morality. (more) FOUNDATION PIT by Platonov, Andrei (1930) A worker, fired for thinking too much on the job, sets off on a nightmarish, almost surreal quest for truth and meaning. He ends up on a crew digging the foundation pit for a gigantic proletarian edifice. Some workers are then sent to the countryside to assist in the collectivization campaign. Workers are murdered; peasants slaughter and gorge themselves on their livestock to keep it from being collectivized; kulak and sub-kulak forces are liquidated; a proletarian bear, adept at sniffing out kulaks, keeps everyone awake with his noisy hammering; and the fate of the tvordii znak (hard sign) is in doubt.(more)
Petrarch's Sonnet by Pogodin, Nikolai (1956). A solid, reliable, middle-aged man (Sukhodolov) develops a pure (Petrarchic) love for a young woman and starts writing her letters (his "sonnets"). Those still in the thrawl of the "bourgeois morality" of the Stalinst past get in a tizzy over this supposed violation of socialist morality (even though the lovers never actually do anything physically). An official investigation is launched, but Sukhodolov refuses to cooperate, saying that there are some reaches of the human heart and human emotion which are none of the Party's business.
(more)Callow Youth by Rekemchuk, Aleksandr (1962). In Siberia, a young worker named Nikolai is dispatched to a nearby town to demand bricks for his construction team. He quickly succeeds and also helps convert the brick factory to new technology. A friend narrowly avoids involvement in a shady money-making scheme; Nikolai gets a kiss; repressed Old Bolsheviks live happily ever after; and, inspired by Yuri Gagarin, practically everyone volunteers to go to the moon. (more) Iron Flood by Serafimovich, Aleksandr (1924). A squabbling, undisciplined, and disorganized rabble of Red fighters and refugees attempt to flee from some pursing Cossacks and join up with the main Red Army units. They escape annihilation only by finally uniting and submitting to the iron will of their newly elected commander, who promises death as punishment for the slightest insubordination. (more) Two Deaths by Serafimovich, Aleksandr (1926). Street fighting rages on in Moscow. A young woman volunteers to spy on the Whites and has to pay the ultimate price. (more) Mess Mend, or a Yankee in Petrograd by Shaginyan, Marietta (1923 - 1924). Amusing spy thriller, comedy, and science fiction novel all rolled into one. Western capitalists and members of the deposed nobility plot to assassinate Lenin and the entire Soviet government. But they are foiled by a secret American workers organization, the Soviet government, and nature itself, which afflicts the deposed princes, capitalists, etc., with a bizarre degenerative disease, literally turning them into beasts.(more)
Snowball Berry Red by Shukshin, Vasily (1973). An ex-con moves to the countryside, hoping to start a new life. He gets side-tracked with a bit of debauchery, but eventually settles down as a tractor driver. Unfortunately, his old gang, unhappy about being abandoned, catch up with him for a final, fatal confrontation. (more)
Chocolate by Tarasov-Rodionov, Aleksandr (1922). A local Cheka chief is falsely accused of bribery and corruption. Revolutionary justice demands that he be shot, despite his innocence. (more) AELITA by Tolstoy, Aleksei (1923). A Soviet engineer and his adventurer-companion blast off for Mars in a home-made spaceship. There they discover an ancient civilization and its strange connection to the lost continent of Atlantis. While the engineer falls in love with the mysterious Aelita, the adventurer dallies with a servant girl (even though he has a wife back in Petrograd). Martian society is on the brink of revolution. The government, suspicious of the Earthlings, plots to kill them. The Soviet Earthlings, however, experienced at this sort of thing, take charge of the workers' uprising. The Martian government strikes back and crushes the rebellion. The Soviets escape from the planet in the nick of time as millions of gigantic, hate-filled spiders surge up from the bowels of the planet. (more) Azure Cities by Tolstoy, Aleksei N. (1925). Utopian socialism clashes with everyday reality, leading to murder. "A passionate tale of a tormenting, impatient, and feverish imagination." (more) House on the Embankment by Trifonov, Yuri (1976). Revolves around life in a famous Moscow apartment house which served as the home of many of the Soviet elite.... (more) Sisters by Veresaev, Vikenty (1933). One of two Komsomol sisters is ruthless in rooting out kulaks and forcing peasants into the kolkhozes. The other sister defies Party orders and works instead for "voluntary" collectivization. She is about to be purged but is saved when Stalin publishes his "Giddy From Success" article denouncing the excesses of forced collectivization. (more)
From the Point of View of Eternity by Zagrebelny, Pavlo (1971). Given the task of creating special pipes for a secret project, a young Ukrainian worker and his team battle a stagnation-bent careerist and defy official orders to develop a fundamentally new pipe-rolling technique. The breakthrough comes following a literal and figurative marriage of brains and brawn. (more)
Guests by Zorin, Leonid (1954).
Intergenerational conflict centered around an honest Old Bolshevik and his adult son, who has become an arrogant,
corrupt, materialistic bigwig, interested only in his position and comfort. The bigwig engages in an arbitrary injustice and plots to ruin the career of an innocent man. The Old Bolshevik uncovers the plot and banishes his son. Even the bigwig's own son--a representative of the younger generation--promises to wage tireless war on his father and all like him. Published in Feb 1954, it is one of the first Thaw-era work.(more)
Abduction Of The Sorcerer by Bulychev, Kir (1981). Time travelers from the future stop off in the present on their way to the past to kidnap a 13th-century sorcerer. (more)
Hunting For The Past by Prozorovsky, Lev (1985). Chasing a CIA spy with links to the Nazi past through Latvia and Estonia. (more) Seventeen Moments of Spring by Semyonov, Julian. Soviet super-spy Stirlitz, working undercover in the Nazi SS, defeats an attempt by the U.S. and Britain to conclude a separate peace with Nazi Germany and open a joint front against the Soviet Union (more) Mess Mend, or a Yankee in Petrograd by Shaginyan, Marietta (1923 - 1924). Amusing spy thriller, comedy, and science fiction novel all rolled into one. Western capitalists and members of the deposed nobility plot to assassinate Lenin and the entire Soviet government. But they are foiled by a secret American workers organization, the Soviet government, and nature itself, which afflicts the deposed princes, capitalists, etc., with a bizarre degenerative disease, literally turning them into beasts.(more) 
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MetrOpol Madness! An independent journal explained and condemned (with exaggerations!) "Trash, not literature!" In 1979, Vassily AKSYONOV, Andrei BITOV, Viktor YEROFEEV, Fazil ISKANDER, and Evgeny POPOV edited and issued METROPOL, an independent literary almanac providing shelter for "homeless" Soviet literature, which was shunned by offical organs. The lack of censorship and the wildcat nature of this venture provoked a firestorm of criticism from official sources. SovLit.com now offers: Introduction to Metropol, wherein the almanac's editors explain their motivation and goals; Metropol Minutes, minutes of a Writers Union meeting wherein the editors are hauled in and raked over the coals; and Pornography of the Soul, a selection of official Soviet criticism of Metropol and its editors. 
Uncivil Literary War:In the mid-1920s, Moscow literary society was seething. The numerous separate literary organizations were engaged in heated battles with one another. Youthful fervor and revolutionary zeal were often combined with intolerance, abuse, and the merciless "working over" of literary opponents. Chief among the bully-boys was RAPP, the Russian Association of Proletarian Writers, which was keen on seizing literary hegemony for itself. In the spring of 1925, rumors swirled that the Communist Party was on the verge of issuing a decree calling for a more tolerant and solicitious attitude toward "fellow-travelers", peasant-writers, and other literary groups. In a direct swipe at the RAPP, the decree was also to call for an end to Communist arrogance and the tone of command in literary criticism. Foreseeing an extended period of peaceful competition among literary trends and styles, the decree declared that literary hegemony was not to be bestowed upon any one particular group, but was to be earned. Frightened by these rumors, the RAPP tried one last, desperate attempt to liquidate all rival literary organizations before the Party could act. In particular they were eager to get rid of their chief nemesis: The Smithy, headed by Fyodor Gladkov. Uncivil War: Fyodor Gladkov & The Smithy vs. RAPP is an account of a stormy meeting in which RAPP tried to manipulate The Smithy out of existence and of how Gladkov, Serafimovich, and other Smiths fought back. In addition, SovLit.com also presents an English translation of the Party decree which provoked RAPP's underhanded attempt: On the Party's Policy in the Sphere of Artistic Literature, 1 July 1925. 
"Bard" Poetry & Prose"Hey, Driver" & "Rafts" by Vladimir Vysotsky Vladimir Vysotsky, everyone's favorite bard, produced over 600 songs and fewer prose works. He was beloved by all strata of society-- taxi drivers, Party officials, and criminals. There is even a report that Cosmonauts took a Vysotsky tape along on one of their space journeys. Despite his immense popularity, not a single one of his songs was officially published in the Soviet Union during his life time. Some of his works did appear in "Metropol", an independent literary almanac which Vassily Aksyonov put together in 1979. But this highly unorthodox compilation was rejected immediately by the Writers Union and condemned as "pornography of the soul." Vysotsky himself jokingly referred to the project as "making conterfeit money." Nowadays, of course, Vysotsky's work is available everywhere, including here at SovLit.com. We are pleased to begin our Vystosky offerings with: (1) a bilingual Russian-English edition of his song-poem, "Hey, Driver", in which the narrator attempts a nostalgic tour of his favorite Soviet prisons; and (2) a translation of "Rafts", a short prose work wherein Vysotsky rails against tugboat men and drunkenness. ("Hey, Driver") and ("Rafts") Smithy Theory 
by Nikolai Lyashko (Click here to read the entire text of N. Lyashko's essay "On the Tasks of the Writer Worker".) 
The moderator of the debate, A.V. Lunacharsky, sided with LEF on the question of establishing a distinctly proletarian culture. But he warned the youth not to get carried away with LEF. For example, while he found a certain degree of artistic honesty in the work of Mayakovsky, Lunacharsky was dismayed by the extreme affectation of form, which, he contended, could lead one to think that there is no depth of feeling behind it. A complete review of this debate was published in the fourth issue of LEF. To read this review, CLICK HERE. 
MAYAKOVSKY ON FUTURISM &THE LEF PROGRAM In 1923 Mayakovsky then founded a movement and journal entitled LEF (The Left Front of Art). Three essays by Mayakovsky and his collaborators, appearing in the inaugural issue of the journal, laid out The LEF Program. The lead essay, "What is LEF Fighting For?", traces the history of Futurism and describes its current tasks: to agitate the masses and to create a united Left Front of art for the destruction of the old culture. Proletarian writers are by in large dismissed as reactionaries regarding form. The experiments of Pilnyak and The Serapions are seen merely as weak attempts to adapt and dilute the devices of the Futurists. The second essay, "Whom Does LEF Tear Into?", identifies LEF's enemies: those with the evil intention of an ideological restoration; those who preach a classless, universal art; and those who drag the metaphysics of prophecy and priesthood into art. Certain politicians are also told to keep their grubby hands out of art. "Whom Does LEF Warn?" boasts that members of LEF are the "best workers in contemporary art". But it also warns Futurists, Constructivist, Productivists and others of complacency, cautioning that they cannot live off the interest of yesterday's revolutionality. (Click here for "Mayakovsky on Futurism".) -- (Click here for "The LEF Program".) 
50 Years Ago Blames "Ignoramuses" KGB Calls Him a "Drunk" He left behind a note which was a blistering, insulting attack on the leadership of the Soviet government and the Soviet literary bureaucracy. In this, his final statement, Fadeev said things which, perhaps, could only be said by a dead man. In its investigation of the matter, the KGB attributed the death simply to Fadeev's alcohol problem. (Click here to read Fadeev's suicide note and two KGB reports on his death.) FOURTEEN LITTLE RED HUTS A New Translation ! SovLit.com is proud to present the text of Fourteen Little Red Huts in a new translation by Gennadi V. Alexeyev and Dmitri G. Alexeyev. (Click here to read Act One of Fourteen Little Red Huts.) (Click here for Act Two.) (Click here for Act Three.) (Click here for Act Four.) 
by 1 Zoshchenko A SovLit.com Festival ! 100 YEARS OF SHOLOKHOV Biography of Mikhail Sholokov. A cradle-to-grave summary of the writer's life. "Birthmark" (1924) Sholokhov's very first short story, about the clash of a young Red commander and the wizened old leader of an anti-Soviet band of marauding Cossack brigands. The complete text in English. "Fate of a Man" (1957) Detailed summary of Sholokhov's tale about a Soviet soldier who is captured by the Nazis during the war. He loses his entire family and his will to live. After the war he slips into drunkenness and depression until a young boy gives him a new reason for living. Speech to the 2nd Congress of Soviet Writers (1954) Text of Sholokhov's speech to the 2nd Congress of Soviet Writers, in which he gives a lukewarm endorsement to the Thaw, calling most post-war literature dull and boring, but avoiding discussion of calls for more openness, honesty, and "sincerity" in Soviet literature. Speech to the 20th Congress of The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (1956) Text of Sholokhov's speech to the de-Stalinizing 20th Party Congress. He blasts Soviet writers, calling most of them "dead souls". About Little Boy Harry and Big Mister Salisbury (1960) An article in which Sholokov attacks American journalist Harrison Salisbury for the meanness and stupidity of his articles on Sholovkhov's Virgin Soil Upturned. Sholokhov accuses Salisbury of metaphoric murder and urges that he be publicly flogged Sholokhov Slams Solzhenitsyn! (1967) In a letter to the Union of Writers, Sholokhov demands that dissident writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn be excluded from the Union. The reason: Solzhenitsyn is either insane or a dangerous anti-Soviet; either way, says Sholokhov, "the man cannot be trusted with a pen." Further, Sholokhov calls Solzhenitsyn's writing "feeble and foolish" and lumps him in with the Vlasovites, those Soviets who betrayed their motherland and joined the Nazis to fight against the USSR during the Great Patriotic War. Introducing Sholokhov by Aleksandr Serafimovich. The short introduction to Tales of the Don (1926), Sholokhov's first collection of stories, written by veteran Soviet-Cossack writer A. Serafimovich. "Comrade Sholokhov's stories stand out like a steppeland flower." About Sholokhov by Konstantin Fedin. "He has never side-stepped the contradictions inherent in life....Sholokhov omits nothing, he writes the whole truth." M.A. Sholokhov by C.P. Snow. "The Quiet Don is a great novel...but a mysterious and difficult one. It speaks of the bafflement of ordinary men...but under the surface there is a subjective, passionate sense of life. A tragic sense of life." An Artist Who Has Enriched The World by Yuri Bondarev. "Sholokhov never follows a straight corridor carpeted with comfortable truths. On the contrary, his target is the all-absorbing truth that is won through struggle and suffering, a truth that is rugged and unkempt and baptized in blood." The Making of "The Fate of a Soldier" by Vladimir Monakhov.. Sholokhov gives advice to filmmakers on adapting his story for the screen. "If you want to make a film out of my story...make it a bit on the boring side." A Sholokhov Photo Gallery. Photos from the life of Mikhail Sholokhov. Includes some embarrassing baby pictures. Official Sholokhov Centenary Souvenir Brochure. Information by and about Sholokhov from the SovLit.com celebration in honor of the author's centenary. 
at War! Vasili Tyorkin: A Book About a Soldier. by Aleksandr Tvardovsky. The most popular piece of literature about the war read by soldiers during the war. It presented a new soldier folk hero who was clever, witty, inventive, thoughtful, resourceful, dependable, courageous, and fun-loving. Vasili Tyorkin fought Nazis hand-to-hand, was wounded several times, slogged through marshes, swam a freezing river to rescue his comrades, shot down a plane with his rifle, settled arguments, made with the wisecracks and could play a mean accordion. In the War by Vasili Grossman. Short story about a loner tank-driver who slowly comes to bond with his fellow tank-crew member and learn the strength and value of comradeship and love. June-December by Konstantin Simonov. Report on the changes in the psychology of Soviet troops after the first six months of war. "Our army has learnt how to conquer the Germans." In Berlin's Neighborhoods by Boris Gorbatov. In Berlin with the conquering Red Army, Gorbatov gloats and taunts Berliners. "Hitler's citadel of obscurantism and piracy is at its end." In the Name of Kirov by Aleksandr Fadeev. Report on workers in Leningrad during the blockade. Fadeev conducts a literary evening amid exploding shells. Volga - Mississippi by Konstantin Fedin. A war-time appeal to Americans, comparing the two great rivers. Freedom or Death by Ilya Ehrenburg. (Agitational essay from first weeks of war.) In The Main Line of Attack by Vasili Grossman. (Report on Siberian troops in Stalingrad.) The Last Wish by Pyotr Pavlenko. (A dying marine gets recorded on film.) (more) 
THAW-ERA NEWS:TVARDOVSKY AXED ! (How and why Aleksandr Tvardovsky was fired as chief editor of Novy Mir.) Ehrenburg Blasts Conservatives! (Ehrenburg's speech at 2nd Congress of Soviet Writers [1954] in defense of the Thaw and against untruthfulness and distortion in Soviet literature.) Sholokhov Gives Tepid Endorsement to Thaw; Blasts Ehrenburg! (1954) Text of Sholokhov's speech to the 2nd Congress of Soviet Writers, in which he gives a lukewarm endorsement to the Thaw, calling most post-war literature dull and boring, but avoiding discussion of calls for more openness, honesty, and "sincerity" in Soviet literature. Attempting to appear even-handed, Sholokhov criticizes both Simonov (anti-Thaw) and Ehrenburg (pro-Thaw). Konstantin Fedin on the State of Soviet Literature, 1957. Short excerpt from an interview in which Fedin comments on the "invigoration" of Soviet literature and its renewed willingness to present the conflicts and ugliness of life. THAW-ERA TEXTS: Light in the Window by Yuri Nagibin (1956) Blasts the wasteful, pointless, and just plain unfair privilege enjoyed by the elite. Trip Home by Nikolai Zhdanov (1956). Dares to ask the question: "Have the Party and goverment been just in their dealings with the people?" 
On Sincerity in Literature
by Vladimir Pomerantsev. Appearing in the December 1953 issue of the journal Novy Mir, this essay attacked insincerity and the varnishing of reality in socialist realism. It provoked a firestorm of controversy and marked the beginning of The Thaw in Soviet literature. "Just say NO to tractors!"Levers by A. Yashin (1956). The blockbuster story that shocked a nation, lambasting Party officials as duplicitous, bureaucratic, and pedantic, treating people as mere levers to be manipulated, not as human beings. The Resident by Vasily Grossman (1960). Story which asks the question: "Rehabilitation...does anyone really care?" On the Mistakes of Novy Mir. (1954). Article from Literaturnaya Gazeta castigating Novy Mir and its editor, Aleksandr Tvardovsky, for the journal's pro-Thaw writings. (part of the "Tvardovsky Axed" feature.) Also, Detailed Summaries of the novels and plays: Guests by Leonid Zorin, The Thaw by Ilya Ehrenburg, Those Who Seek by Daniil Granin, Alone by Samuil Aleshin, Not By Bread Alone by Vladimir Dudintsev, and Petrarch's Sonnet by Nikolai Pogodin. 
Conversation of a Rest Home Deputy Director with Guests on the Day of Their Arrival by Mikhail Zadornov (1983) 
Vasili AKSYONOV, Vasili BYKOV, Andrei VOZNESENSKY, Ivan DRATCH, Yevgeni YEVTUSHENKO, Yuri KAZAKOV, Justinas MARCINKEVICIUS, and Anatoli PRISTAVKIN respond to a questionnaire circulated in 1962 by the journal Voprosi Literaturi (Problems of Literature). "Remebering Nikolai Ostrovsky" by Anna Karavaeva Bard Music & Poetry Bulat Okudzhava Analysis of the thematic and stylistic similarities of the two poets. (1952) Konstantin Fedin Comments on Ilya Ehrenburg "...His genre is words that act...." From the Notebooks of Andrei Platonov Material which Platonov himself wanted suppresssed, liberated in 1973 by his widow and offered up for the world to read. Mikhail Bulgakov Remembers Gudok Excerpt from an unfinished manuscript by Bulgakov in which he recalls his work at the newspaper Gudok. He calls the work there "odious" and "a nightmare"; the sketches he wrote for the paper he describes as full of "stereotypes" and "coarseness". I Remember Mayakovsky. Lydia Seifullina recalls her first sighting of Mayakovsky.
IRON SILENCE by Nikolai Lyashko (1924). A story dealing with the painful scab of stagnation which has come to cover a factory...a factory where workers once suffered under the whip...a factory which crucified workers on its spinning metal gears in ghastly industrial accidents...a factory which gave workers shelter as they studied the revolutionary truth and fought battles with strike-breaking Cossacks. Now the factory lies abandoned and crumbling, dismantled piece by piece by pilferers and looters. Workers long to take up the hammer again, but Party officials get nothing done. (Click here to read entire story text.) Death of Dolgushov by Babel, Isaac (1924). Cowardly, bespectacled intellectual (just like Babel) refuses to put a fatally wounded Red Army soldier out of his misery, preferring to keep his hands clean no matter the cost. (Complete text in English) Flying Carpet by Beliyaev, Aleksandr A scientist is convinced that fleas are superior to humans--at least in terms of leaping ability. He sets out to right this injustice of nature and nearly ends up stranded in the stratosphere. Science-fiction comedy. (Complete Text in English) Three Kopecks by Bulgakov, Mikhail The story of the little man, a railroad employee, coming up against bureaucracy and the taxman. And--reader beware: this story contains nudity. (Complete Text in English) Mad Boy by Dudintsev, Vladimir (1958). A cruel boy taunts a friendly dog and gets bitten. The boy's intellectual, Volga-owning father complains to authorities, but the neighbors defend the dog. The boy gets his comeuppance in the form of painful rabies shots. (Beshenii Mal'chishka) (Complete Text in Russian) Blood Knot by Dumbadze, Nodar (c. 1984) An old man and an old woman battle each other to win the custody of their less-than-perfect grandson. (Georgian) (Complete text in English) Tale of the Military Secret by Gaidar, Arkady (1935). The peaceful Soviet motherland is subjected to a perfidious sneak attack by bourgeois forces. As the Soviet fathers and older brothers are killed, little children have to join the battle. One such child is the Malchik-Kilbachish. He is captured and tortured, but remains true to his word and does not reveal the great military secret of what makes the motherland and the workers of the world so strong. His bravery gives the Red Army the time it needs to ride to the rescue. (Complete text in both English and Russian) Marcelle by Gerasimov, Mikhail (1920) A young female French Communist secretly boards a French warship to agitate among the sailors, who are hugry for word on the revolution in Russia. The sea itself gets involved in the revolutionary struggle, heaving and seething in an attempt to cast off the warships and their weapons of death. Gerasimov was a member of the "Smithy" proletarian writers group. (Click here to read entire story text.) In The Country by Grossman, Vasily (1960). The story of terror and a man alone. Snow, an axe, a bluebird, and blood combine to create an allegorical mystery, with the reader left to determine the meaning. Is the terror real, or is it just paranoia? (Click here to read entire story.) IN THE WAR by Vasili Grossman (1942). A positive, inspirational story of a loner tank-driver, who, during the course of the war, slowly comes to develop bonds of friendship with his fellow tank crew members. When he is wounded and sent to the rear, he comes to recognize the strength of this comradeship and he realizes, for the first time in his life, the power and value of love. (Click here to read entire story text.) A Tale About Happiness by Grossman, Vasily (1934-1935). What is happiness? For some, it's found in traipsing off to a distant construction site, living in a barracks while leaving the wife and kids behind. Others find it in a bauble, a golden ring, a piece of scented soap. And some never find it at all; or if they do, they can't recognize it. In the mid-1930s, Vasily Grossman addressed this deceptively simple dilemma in a deceptively simple and short story, presented here in a new translation. (Click here to read entire story.) The Resident by Grossman, Vasily (1960). Story which asks the question: "Rehabilitation...does anyone really care?" (Click here to read entire story.) Conversations at Tea by Ilf, Ilya & Petrov, Evgeny (1934). Satiric story which touches on a generation gap between an Old Bolshevik and his 12-year-old son, arising from the excessively "revolutionary" education the boy is receiving at school. Fortunately, the Central Committee steps in just in time with a back-to-basics decree, thereby saving a hapless 8-year-old from being worked over politically. The story also takes a swipe at politically correct but inane poetry as was often celebrated by super-orthodox literary goups such as RAPP. (Complete text in English) Interplanetary Chess Congress by Ilf, Ilya & Petrov, Evgeny In an excerpt from "The 12 Chairs", con man Ostap Bender transforms a backwaters Volga River town into the chess capital of the universe. (Complete text in English) Pushkin and Gogol by Kharms, Daniil Pushkin and Gogol are falling all over each other. A short play. (Complete text in English) Ivan Ivanych Samovar by Kharms, Daniil. A friendly samovar dispenses tea. Late risers, however, are in for a surprise. (Complete text in English) IRON SILENCE by Nikolai Lyashko (1924). A story dealing with the painful scab of stagnation which has come to cover a factory...a factory where workers once suffered under the whip...a factory which crucified workers on its spinning metal gears in ghastly industrial accidents...a factory which gave workers shelter as they studied the revolutionary truth and fought battles with strike-breaking Cossacks. Now the factory lies abandoned and crumbling, dismantled piece by piece by pilferers and looters. Workers long to take up the hammer again, but Party officials get nothing done. (Click here to read entire story text.) My First and Most Beloved Friend by Nagibin, Yuri. Two boys develop a deep and lasting relationship which carries them through the usual boyhood and adolescent experiences, adventures, and the search for identity. They are separated only by war, when one of them dies. Years later, an accidental visit by the surviving friend to the battlefield where the other died brings back memories as well as feelings of guilt for not also dying. (Complete Text in English) Cherry Seed by Olesha, Yuri (1929). A dreamer, who spends most of his time in the invisible world of his imagination, plants a cherry tree in honor of his unrequited love, without first asking the permission of the Five Year Plan. (Complete text in English) The Alcoholic's Brother by Panteleev, Aleksei (1960). Short story illustrating that you can't believe every denunciation that you hear. (Complete text in English) The Coward by Panteleev, Aleksei (1941). Very short story showing that cowardice equals greed and collectivism equals courage. (Complete text in English) I Want To Live by Shukshin, Vasily (1966) An escaped convict tries to make it out of the Siberian taiga in winter. Luckily for him, he comes across an old hunter, who shares his remote cabin and his wisdom. The convict repays this kindness with brutality. (Complete text in English) A Midsummer Day's Game by Soloukhin, Vladimir. A grandfather teaches his granddaughter a game from his youth. The girl enjoys the game, then updates it to modern conditions and modern technology. (Complete text in English) A Political Battle by Veresaev, Vikenty (1933). In an excerpt from the novel Sisiters, two teams of factory workers engage in a type of "Trivial Pursuit" to see who knows the most about the Five Year Plan. They answer burning questions such as: "What is the fundamental idea of the Five Year Plan?" and "What will happen to the kulaks when the collective farms have taken over the whole agricultural domain?" (Complete text in English) Rafts by Vysotsky, Vladimir (1968). A short prose work wherein Vysotsky rails against tugboat men and drunkenness. (Complete text in English) The Lion by Zamyatin, Evgeny (1935). The great king of the jungle, the lion, is dead drunk. In order to win the love of Leningrad's first policewoman, a fire fighter from Ryazan offers to take the lion's place. (Complete text in English) Pictures by Zamyatin, Evgeny The narrator tests and taunt's a child's perception of reality. (Complete text in English) STORY OF AK AND HUMANITY by Efim Zozulya (1925) "All citizens must immediately provide proof of their right to exist. Those found to be unnecessary and a hindrance to progress will be given 24 hours to leave this life." This, in essence, is the beginning of Efim Zozulya's "Story of Ak and Humanity". The citizens in this imaginary state happily surrender absolute authority to their government, which has promised a better life. The people, then, have no one but themselves to blame when this government hits on a simple solution: liquidate the unnecessary. Naturally, panic grips the city as commissions go from door to door, searching for human rubbish. A work as relevant today as it was when written over eighty years ago. (Warrentless wiretaps, anyone?) (Click here to read entire story text.) For the Soviets, fairy tales weren't just kid stuff. Some of the most prominent Soviet authors worked in the genre. SovLit.com presents translations of two tales with a winter theme: "Snow House" by Aleksei N. Tolstoy
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The Story of Zoya & Shura "Here, comrades! Why do you look so gloomy? Be brave. Fight on, fight on!" Zoya's brother, Shura, who fell in battle near Koenigsberg, was also recognized as a Hero of the Soviet Union. Zoya and Shura's mother, Lyubov Kosmodemyanskaya, memorialized her children with her book, The Story of Zoya & Shura, the entire text of which is now available on-line. For posting this text and honoring these two great Soviet heros, Michael Bessler and greeklish.org are recognized as SovLit.com's Comrade of the Month.
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