A Writer at War. Vasily Grossman with the Red Army 1941-1945

This book is one of the best accounts of the Soviet front out there. It is fascinating (although I may be biased, I do love accounts focusing on the actual people on the ground). It is fantastically edited in an attempt to tell a complete story. The raw quotes hit deep and hard, they are exquisite. I highly recommend it, if you won't read anything else about the USSR during this time period, at least read this.

This is the book that introduced me to Vasily Grossman, and I am now determined to read all his novels. His writing style is gripping, but so are his observations. I enjoyed how he focused on the specific everyday person. It is refreshing, compared to many other war time books that focus on the commandants and officers or war show more strategies.

On a personal note, this book changed my outlook on life in general and the USSR. It was a gripping read but heavy, I got through it slowly, I annotated, this was all I could talk about for months. I genuinely believe this is one of those books I will carry with me wherever I move and reread often. show less

Vasily Grossman wrote one of my favourite novels, [b:Life and Fate|88432|Life and Fate|Vasily Grossman|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1320447178s/88432.jpg|2435598]. It is astounding that the novel was only published because a friend had a copy of the manuscript, which was smuggled into Switzerland years later. Grossman died thinking that his magnificent book would be suppressed forever. In 'A Writer At War' the reader finds the seeds of [b:Life and Fate|88432|Life and Fate|Vasily Grossman|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1320447178s/88432.jpg|2435598], as Grossman reported from the Eastern Front throughout the war. He observed the disastrous Soviet losses of 1941, the Battle of Stalingrad, the turning of the tide against the show more Axis, and the rush to Berlin. The book is for the most part a digest of his notebooks, with excepts from his colleagues' writing, contextual notes, and some of the pieces he filed for Red Star (the Red Army newspaper).

Much of the book thus consists of fragments, although it holds together very well. Grossman was embedded within the Red Army and interviewed all the soldiers he could, of every rank, as well as civilians. He had an eye for interesting details and anecdote. There is an interesting tension between his idealistic desire to report individual experiences and his patriotic duty to produce good propaganda. Grossman complained in letters to his relatives that his pieces were edited and changed in ways he disliked. Moreover, the contents of his notebooks would have brought him trouble had they been read by the authorities. Although he was wholly loyal to the Soviet regime, there was zero tolerance of criticism in Stalinist Russia. The fact that he recorded mistakes, desertions, and bad behaviour within the Red Army would have been suspect in itself. It is also notable that Grossman’s idealistic view of the army, which was perhaps at its height during the terrible days of Stalingrad’s defence, declined once the army advanced beyond Russia’s borders. The looting, rape, and vengeful violence enacted by the army was chronicled by Grossman, along with the victorious advance.

There are two elements of this book that will really stick in my memory. The first is Kuznechik the camel, who accompanied the 308th Rifle Division on their advance from Stalingrad to Berlin. Upon arrival in Berlin, he was allegedly led to the Reichstag in order to spit upon its ruins. He also received a medal 'For the Defence of Stalingrad'. Given the appalling level of casualties during the Battle of Stalingrad in particular and on the Eastern Front in general, there is something magical and charming about the idea that a camel could survive it all.

The most memorable part of the book, however, is the section on Treblinka. Unlike the rest of the chapters, it is a long contiguous piece of Grossman’s writing, presented with only brief initial context. This essay, titled ‘The Hell of Treblinka’ was quoted at the Nuremberg trials. It is utterly incredible, the part of the book that most clearly shows Grossman’s immense writing talent. When I reached the end of it, I looked up from the book and listened to my breathing for a moment to remind myself that I was still alive. Grossman saw Treblinka and interviewed the handful of survivors found by the Red Army. The piece is as devastating and horrific as any first hand account of the Holocaust I’ve read. What gives it exceptional impact is the insight into the psychology of the concentration camp. Grossman attempts to explain how twenty-five or so SS men and around a hundred Ukrainian auxiliaries were able to destroy an estimate eight hundred thousand people, through deception, manipulation, and dehumanisation. He ends by describing the grotesque attempts to dismantle and cover up the camp, finally presenting the image of the earth being unable to hide evidence of the massacres. Amongst the lupins that grew on the site of Treblinka, he found items belonging to those murdered, even locks of their hair. The full text of ‘The Hell of Treblinka’ can be found here: http://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/47875651/TheHellOfTreblinka.html I think it is a very important thing to read.

Given the power of this piece, I was shocked that Grossman was not actually asked to report on the concentration camps the Red Army discovered in Poland. The colleague who did, Simonov, was careful to avoid mentioning that the vast majority of victims were Jewish. As the editors comment, 'the Stalinist line refused to accept any special categories of suffering'. Grossman’s articles on Nazi atrocities were censored to reduce 'emphasis on the Jews as victims,' and to suppress evidence that former Soviet states had collaborated in the Holocaust.

'A Writer At War' is fascinating, powerful, and moving as history, as war reporting, as biography, as autobiography, and as context for some of the best novels of the twentieth century. I highly recommend it. show less

A Writer at War is a very good book and much of the writing, especially concerning the battle of Stalingrad, provided material for Grossman's masterpiece, Life and Fate. Antony Beevor and Luba Vinogradova translated and edited Grossman's war diaries, and explain the historical contexts in short notes which are very helpful. In some ways, this book is a nice complement to Catherine Merridale's, Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army 1939-1945. Grossman was there, and reported on, many of the pivotal moments of the war: the original battle for Moscow, the battle of Stalingrad, the great tank battle at Kursk, the invasion of Poland, Warsaw, and the entry into Berlin, plus he was in the advance guard that liberated the camps of Majdanek show more and Treblinka.

Grossman was honest about what he saw and what he wanted to write about. This sometimes ran him afoul of the authorities, especially when he wanted to write about the murder of Jews and the collaboration of Ukrainians and others. Such things simply could not be published in his main paper, Krasnaya Zveda (Red Star), but he did manage to publish some accounts, suitably sanitized to protect himself, in a Jewish journal and through his work on The Black Book that was intended to chronicle the German murder of Jews in the Soviet Union. The Black Book never saw the light of day after the war.

Grossman had a fine eye for the details that paint the bigger picture whether it was a battle or a destroyed village. He was a favourite among the troops because he understood their feelings and their privations while he at the same time wrote about their bravery. This was never more evident than in his dispatches from the hell of Stalingrad. Grossman describes the panic and despair of the early months of the war when all seemed lost and the Red Army was continually falling back when it was not being surrounded and destroyed. The turning point was the successful defense of Moscow after which there was a growing sense that victory could be possible, however, more terrible setbacks were in store, and it wasn't until after Stalingrad that the tide had clearly turned. At the battle of Kursk, the Wehrmacht had been decisively outfought and, "The Red Army had proved once again the dramatic improvement in the professionalism of its commanders, the morale of its soldiers and the effective application of force." Although, even then, Grossman was not blind to continuing defects such as his observation that, "...units continued to suffer from the inability of Red Army commanders and staff officers to think things through." Grossman is unsparing in his assessment of army commanders, the good, the bad and the ugly; nor does he even try to gloss over the continuing tensions among the nationalities of the Soviet Union, the too-free use of manpower in wasted attacks, the contempt and hatred of the ordinary soldier for the political advisors, the drunkenness, the looting, the mass rapes through Poland and into Germany, even including Russian women who had been prisoners of the Germans and who were at first overjoyed to be liberated by the Red Army.

Grossman also maintained a broader historical perspective and, again, an eye for the detail that carries a thousand images. For instance, his description of wandering through the ruined Reichschancellery, Speer's monument to the grandiosity of the Nazi regime that thought it would live for a thousand years:

"The new Reichschancellery. It's a monstrous crash of the regime, ideology, plans, everything, everything. Hitler kaputt....Hitler's office. The reception hall. A huge foyer, in which a young Kazakh, with dark skin and broad cheekbones, is learning to ride a bicycle, falling off it now and then. Hitler's armchair and table. A huge metal globe, crushed and crumpled, plaster, planks of wood, carpets. Everything is mixed up. It's chaos. Souvenirs, books with dedicatory inscriptions to the Fuhrer, stamps, etc."

Throughout his reporting, Grossman often dwelt upon the sufferings of ordinary people. He understood them, he talked to them at every opportunity, and he wrote about them and their shattered lives. Yet, despite what he saw and experienced, and the fact that he was tormented all his life by the murder of his mother because she was Jewish, he was able to maintain the distinction between Hitler's men and ordinary Germans. He does not come across a bitter man.

Treblinka was almost too much for Grossman to absorb, as a Jew, and as a human being, but his account, his description of it is one of the most moving I have read...an attempt to describe the indescribable and to pay homage to those murdered there by remembering the humanity that had been stripped from them. His article on this was read out at the Nuremberg trial.

After the war, Grossman fell onto hard times because he was Jewish, because he was outspoken, and because he did not always toe the Party line. Beevor and Vinogradova maintain that he was saved from the Gulag only by Stalin's death. His great novel, Life and Fate was not published in his lifetime; in fact the Soviet authorities tried their best to find and destroy every single copy, and one of the chief ideological authorities said the book would not be published for 200 years in the Soviet Union. Luckily, a friend had managed to save one copy and it eventually make its way to the west where it was published. The book will still be around 200 years from now but of course it is the Soviet Union itself that has long been consigned to the dustbins of history.

To the end of his life, Grossman retained a love and a respect for the ordinary soldier who had experienced extraordinary events and had made extraordinary sacrifices. I would say that as much as anyone can, through language and description, try to portray those events and sacrifices, Grossman did so in these diaries and reports. show less

From the extensive quotes from Grossman and the authors commentaries on them one can only wonder what was left out because of Stalin and his censor's watchful eyes. There is enough here to be of interest but the suspicion is there could be so much more. However, Grossman, a Jew, does not miss the barbarities inflicted on his kind in the Ukraine and the Nazi horrors of the concentration camps in Poland. This is still a must read because where would we go to find such intimate and first hand detail.

Quotes: (page 95) “Grossman was so deeply affected by the genuine spirit of sacrifice among ordinary soldiers and front-line officers that he became quite emotional on the subject.
At war, a Russian puts on a white shirt. He may live in sin, show more but he dies like a saint. At the front {there is} a purity of thought and soul, a kind of monastic austerity.
The rear [the civilian part of the country] lives by different laws and it would never be able to merge morally with the front. Its law is life, and struggle for survival. We Russians don't know how to live like saints, we only know how to die like saints. The front [represents] the holiness of Russian death, the rear is the sin of Russian life.”

(page 187) “One of Grossman's most celebrated articles in Krasnaya Zvezda was entitled 'The Stalingrad Battle', a collection of descriptions, some just vignettes.
In the light of the rockets one sees destroyed buildings, the land covered with trenches, the bunkers in the cliff and gullies, deep holes protected from bad weather by pieces of tin and planks of wood.
'Hey, can you here me? Have they brought dinner yet?' asks a soldier, who is sitting by the entrance of the bunker.
'They left a long time ago to fetch it, and look, they haven't returned yet,' a voice answers from the darkness.
'They either had to shelter somewhere, or they're never coming back. [Enemy] fire around the field kitchen is too heavy.'
'What louses! I badly want dinner,' says the sitting soldier in an unhappy voice, and yawns...

(pages 250-251) “ In the Autumn of 1943 he had written an article entitled 'Ukraine without Jews' . This appears to have been turned down by Krasnaya Zvezda and it appeared in Einikeit, the journal of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee.

There are no Jews in the Ukraine, Nowhere – Poltava, Kharkov, Kremenchug, Borispol, Yagotin – in none of the cities, hundreds of towns, or thousands of villages will you see the black, tear-filled eyes of little girls: you will not see the dark face of a hungry baby. All is silence. Everything is still. A whole people has been brutally murdered,” show less

A Writer at War by Vasily Grossman and edited by Anthony Beevor and Luba Vinogradova. The subtitle of the book is A Soviet Journalist with the Red Army 1941-1945. The book was really interesting because the editors did more than just translate. They also provived a narrative of events and connected Grossman's notebooks to the events of battle and troop movement. Grossman's account of Treblinka in the book is heartbreaking. I would recommend this book to readers who are interested in history and especially World War II.

Wavered on the star rating for this one, but I'll go with four stars, since it was the reading experience and not the book itself I had trouble with. I read it as an ebook, and it just didn't translate well to electronic format: too many photos and maps, and long stretches of italic text that I found strenuous to read. (The print edition sets these off as block-quotes, which I'd have much preferred.)

It's a fascinating read. The editors do a remarkable job taking the raw material and streamlining it into coherence, considering how much of it began as spur-of-the-moment reflections jotted hastily into a notebook. Grossman doesn't attempt to paint a complete picture of the Soviet war effort. He's concerned, rather, with the lives of the show more men on the ground. His--and the everyday Soviet soldier's--experience is related in snapshots, vignettes, one- or two-sentence snippets, with no attempt at whitewashing or sanitizing or even reconciling contradictions. Grossman simply tells it as it is. He's determined to keep the "ruthless truth" of the war free of "ideological and artistic" convention, and he succeeds. show less

Vasili Semenovich Grossman was a decorated Soviet military journalist best known in the West for his epic novel, Life and Fate (New York Review Books Classics). In 'A Writer at War' editors and translators Anthony Beevor (Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege: 1942-1943), an esteemed historian and author in his own right, and Luba Vinogradova, follow Grossman's progression through the war by piecing together stories from his notebooks and writings. At times one would have liked a bit more context to be provided by Beevor, but that is a minor quibble.

Grossman, while still a loyal Communist at this point, managed to maintain a relatively objective viewpoint. He often pushed his editors to allow him to write stories they did not want written, in show more particular regarding the fate of the Jews in the Ukraine under German occupation and the role of the Ukrainians.

While at time the stories have to be stitched together from bits and pieces, `A Writer at War' is a gold mine and provides a rare view into the inner workings of the Soviet military and Soviet military journalism in particular. Grossman experienced the initial German onslaught and the Russian flight from it, Stalingrad, the tank battle at Kursk, and the death camps. The book includes an extensive article on the workings of the German death camp Treblinka. Earns the highest recommendation. show less