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Loading... Por una causa justa (original 1952; edition 2011)by Vasiliï Semenovich Grossman, Andréi Kozinets
Work InformationStalingrad by Vasily Grossman (1952)
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. With the military and strategic insights of a war correspondent and a clear understanding of how to create a feeling of belonging and contribution, Grossman writes a book about war that couldn't be more authentic - and patriotic, for that matter. He touches all the right spots as he describes an incredible communal effort of the whole country through all levels of society and no matter what distance to the front. The choice and description of characters are so magnificently diverse that the war eats up the entire existence of al those concerned, even a mine worker in the urals. I myself can't understand what might have been so threatening to the authorities that the book was censored and stowed away by the Stalinist regime after the war, but maybe that is a problem of the second part of the book that was made into "Life and Fate". As it is, the book paints an incredibly realistic picture of the battle of Stalingrad as deisive for the fate of the nation, with some insights left over for a differentiated - if obviously and rightly negative - view of the Germans who are however not en bloc mindless followers of the Nazi regime. Reading this book was especially challenging given the fact that Ukraine, that seems to have suffered from Stalinist Russia back then, is suffering from Russia again and has to fend off an unjustifiable onslaught just as Russia had to fend off Germany's 80 years ago. Stalingrad is the first book in the duology completed by Life and Fate. In Stalingrad we follow Hitler's advance through Russia, encirclement of the Russian armies, the occupation of Ukraine. The Soviet Army has retreated as far as Stalingrad, the southernmost city in unoccupied Russia, an industrial centre that produces steel and tanks for the Soviet Army. Beyond Stalingrad is the Kazakh steppe. Stalin has ordered that there is to be no retreat. Stalingrad follows the fate of the Shaposhnikov family and its connections. Near the beginning of the book, in the lull before the siege, these family members and friends gather to celebrate the birthday of the matriarch, Alexandra Vladimirovna Shaposhnikova, understanding that they might never meet again. Stalingrad focuses on people: the middle-aged peasant farmers who leave their wives and children to tend the crops, expecting to die; the young boys leaving their work groups for the front; the factory workers; the coal miners; the women left destitute, trying to feed their children. By concentrating on the nobility of individuals, Grossman skirts the unpalatable truth, that many thousands were shot for desertion. This is not the reality he is free to write about in Stalin's Russia. As Marusya, daughter of Alexandra, says, "There is the truth of the reality forced on us by the accursed past. And there’s the truth of the reality which will defeat the past." A chapter on Fascism could well be about Stalinism. Grossman was known to have equated the two. Grossman adapted Stalingrad to the demands of the Soviet censors, who excised humour and references to real conditions, and tried to remove the main Jewish character. Robert Chandler, the translator, has, with the aid of the researcher Yuri Bit-Yunin, restored sections from Grossman's original typescript. Chandler's introduction and his chapter on the alterations he made to the various Russian published texts are informative and well worth reading. In Life and Fate, which was 'arrested' by the Soviets, Grossman writes what he believes. I can recommend Stalingrad, but if you haven't read Life and Fate, read that instead. no reviews | add a review
"Vassily Grossman (1905 - 1964) has become well-known in the last twenty years - above all for his novel Life and Fate. This has often been described as a Soviet (or anti-Soviet) War and Peace. Most readers, however, do not realize that it is only the second half of a dilogy. The first half, originally titled Stalingrad but published in 1952 under the title For a just cause, has received surprisingly little attention. Scholars and critics seem to have assumed that, since it was first published in Stalin's lifetime, it can only be considered empty propaganda. In reality, there is little difference between the two novels. The chapters in the earlier novel about the Shaposhnikov family are as tender, and sometimes humorous, as in the later novel. The chapters devoted to the long retreats of 1941 and the first half of 1942 are perhaps still more vivid than the battle scenes in the later novel"-- No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)891.7342Literature Literature of other languages Literature of east Indo-European and Celtic languages Russian and East Slavic languages Russian fiction USSR 1917–1991 Early 20th century 1917–1945LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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Stalingrad (1952) is based on Grossman's work as a war correspondent for the Red Star, and it features characters from military real life on both sides of the battle. It is the precursor to Life and Fate (1959, see my review) which continues on with events from September 1942. It is sobering to reach the end of a 900+ page book about the battle that changed the course of the war, and then to remember that the war in Europe was to continue for another three years. The loss of life was appalling, and Grossman's literary homage to the dead acknowledges these nameless heroes in unmarked graves with lively fictional characters. But as in real life, not all of them survive.
As Robert Chandler says in his excellent introduction, Grossman is a master of character portrayal, with an unusual gift for conveying someone's feelings through some tiny but vivid detail.
We are privy to scenes of their family life; their transition from peasant or professor to soldiering; their privations, trials, frustrations and doubts; and their anxieties about their comrades and their loved ones, on both sides of the front.
One of the most compelling images is a letter from Viktor Shtrum from his Jewish mother, who refused to leave her village even as the Nazis advanced and the Soviet forces had to retreat. Viktor becomes aware of Nazi atrocities in occupied territory, and he is distraught with anxiety about her fate, but (again, as Chandler makes the reader aware), Grossman, because of anti-semitism under Stalin, had to be circumspect about what he wrote. But the reader can deduce what happens. We are told about Shtrum's mother's last letter and her stoic resignation. We are told about its journey from hand to hand. And we are told how when he finally receives it, Viktor carries the letter about with him wherever he goes, but is unable to talk about it. This authorial silence about the contents of the letter is more poignant when we learn that these events parallel the fate of Grossman's own mother.
In contrast to Anna's death in the ghetto, which we must imagine, there are also deaths which are swift, merciless and as the battles intensify towards the end of the book, relentless. Grossman sets a scene, brings a character to life, depicts his thoughts, words and deeds, and while the reader is still absorbing the death of this vividly rendered character, moves on to the next chapter.
These characters are unforgettable.
Lena Gnatyuk tends to the injured in the ruins, pleading with the injured to keep quiet so that the nearby Germans won't hear them. In these closing chapters the reader has come to know Lena as Kovalyov's heart's desire. In the bunker they have had a fraught conversation, because he has a girl waiting for him at home, and she, though she loves him, is overwhelmed by her duty to the wounded who need her. They are part of a desperate effort to delay the German capture of the railway station until the reserves arrive, and both know that they are likely to die.
In the next chapter, we see Lena at work among the wounded. Yakhontov yells in pain, but comforts the young woman who tends to him.
She reassures a soldier that his two broken legs will be set:
To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2024/05/05/stalingrad-1952-by-vasily-grossman-translate... ( )