Confessions of a Fallen Standard-Bearer
by Andreï Makine
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Description
They are virtual brothers, Arkady and Alyosha, young pioneers in Stalin's postwar world, marching to the clarion call of socialism, to the stirring beat of the drums. The future, they are assured, is bright and beautiful. But what, then, are those endless miles of barbed wire they encounter everywhere along their route? This is the moving, two-generational tale of two families, those of Yakov Zinger and Pyotr Yevdokimov, fathers of the two young pioneers. Inseparable, the two men have been show more through the grueling war against the Germans, with all its horror and senseless carnage. Yakov--or Yasha, as he was known--emerged physically intact but scarred forever "from the moment he had been lifted out of a mountain of frozen bodies at a camp in liberated Poland." Pyotr, a skilled sniper who operated behind the German lines, lost both his legs, not at the hands of the Germans, but as a result of an artillery "mistake" by his own forces. Together, in these postwar, Cold War years, the two families try to piece together their shattered lives. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
A deeply compelling, beautifully written, bitter-sweet but also really sad, memoir-style narrative, which was so relatable for me because of the location and the timing of the events described - from the writer that I admire so much.
A hauntingly vivid and sometimes poetic novella capturing the realities of a childhood in the post-war Soviet Union - a mixture of nostalgia, comic detail and horror, tracing the narrator's journey from a conformist childhood through adolescent disillusion to a present as an emigre writer.
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Author Information
32+ Works 4,451 Members
Andrei Makine was born in Siberia in 1957. Although raised in the Soviet Union, he learned about France and came to love that country through the stories told by his French grandmother. He now lives in Paris himself, having been granted political asylum by France in 1987, and writes in French. His grandmother figures prominently in the show more autobiographical novel, "Dreams of My Russian Summers," for which Makine received both the Goncourt Prize and the Medicis Prize, becoming the first author to simultaneously receive both of these prestigious French awards. In the U.S., the English translation of "Dreams of My Russian Summers" has also received recognition, including the Boston Book Review Fiction Prize and the Los Angeles Times Best Book of the Year award. Andrei Makine is also the author of "Once Upon the River Love" and "The Crime of Olga Arbelina." (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Some Editions
Series
Belongs to Publisher Series
Gallimard, Folio (2883)
Common Knowledge
- Canonical title*
- En fallen fanbärares bekännelse
- Original title
- Confession d'un porte-drapeau déchu
- Original publication date
- 1992
- Important places
- USSR (Soviet Union)
- Dedication*
- Till Marie-Claude
Till Guy - First words*
- Allt var så enkelt. Så klart ...
- Last words*
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)Bara vi har en flik himmel över våra huvuden.
- Original language
- French
*Some information comes from Common Knowledge in other languages. Click "Edit" for more information.
Classifications
- Genres
- Fiction and Literature, General Fiction, Historical Fiction
- DDC/MDS
- 843.914 — Literature & rhetoric French Literature French fiction 1900- 20th Century 1945-1999
- LCC
- PQ2673 .A38416 .C6613 — Language and Literature French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese literatures French literature Modern literature 1961-2000
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 157
- Popularity
- 207,906
- Reviews
- 2
- Rating
- (3.61)
- Languages
- 9 — Czech, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Slovak, Swedish
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 17
- ASINs
- 1
