Vasily Grossman
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Vasily Grossman (Russia, 1905)
Stepan Kolchugin (1940) Zhizn i Sudha/ Life And Fate (1960) is a sprawling fresco of Russian life during the German invasion, and inevitably one compares it to Life and Fate models itself on Tolstoys "War and Peace", set during the French invasion. There are dozen of stories, taking place in several regions, and hundreds of characters. It is partly a war novel, with powerful descriptions of life in the trenches (the siege of Stalingrad). It is also the saga of an extended family (the Shtrum/Shaposhnikov family). And finally it is also the rare novel to document life in the prison camps, both a German one and a Soviet one, and to highlight the similarities between the Nazist regime and the Stalinist regime. Grossman completed the novel in October 1960 but he never saw it published because he died in 1964. The novel opens in a German concentration camp. Mikhail Mostovskoy is an Old Bolshevik who spent years in tsarist prisons and participated in Lenin's revolution of 1917. He speaks German and French. He befriends the Italian priest Gardi, who says that the camps hold people from 56 nationalities, a veritable Babel, and across all social layers, from illiterate peasants to scientists, from German dissidents to Russian prisoners of war. Ordinary criminals have a higher status than political prisoners. The camps are largely managed and maintained by the prisoners themselves. Mostovskoy was captured in Stalingrad together with the Jewish physician Sofya Levinton, of whom he has lost track. He chats with another Russian, Ikonnikov, who calls himself a former Tolstoyan: he used to believe in God until he witnessed the extermination of 20 thousand Jews. He is now an atheist. Ikonnikov lived in a commune, believing in the socialist ideal, but tried to save Jews and ended up in a psychiatric hospital. Ikonnikov, who has witnessed both the Holodomor (Ukrainian genocide by famine) and the Great Purges of 1937, writes a philosophical manifesto, handwritten on scraps of paper. Also in the camp is Chernetsov, a one-eyed Menshevik who had emigrated to Paris and was arrested for rebelling against the French fascists. Mostovskoy also interacts with major Yershov, general Gudz and commissar Osipov. Chapter 7 moves to Stalingrad under siege. Nikolay Krymov, a political commissar, visits general Chuykov's troops and witnesses a suicide mission by general Redimtsev. Chuykov's superior Teremenko crosses the river to visit Chuykov in Stalingrad. Major Byerozkin take a morning walk to inspect Podchufarovs battalion (a dangerous trip). Byerozkin has no news from his wife who has been evacuated to the Urals. The novel then moves to Kazan, where the Jewish physicist Viktor Shtrum lives with his wife Lyudmila Shaposhnikova and their daughter Nadya and his mother-in-law Alexandra. Lyudmila's son Tolya from her first husband Abarchuk is at war. Chapter 18 moves to the ghetto: it is a letter written by a Jewish doctor, Anna, to her son Vitya. When the Germans arrive, the local Russians took advantage of the Jews. A neighbor took her room. When Anna was forced to move into the ghetto like all other Jews, neighbos took her belongings. Only a former patient helped her. She was taken in by a fellow doctor, Sperling. She has heard of massacre of Jews and is aware that she will be killed and thrown in a mass grave. We learn that Vitya is Viktor the scientist when he receives the letter. Chapter 20 returns to Kazan. Viktor's wife Lyudmila receives news that her son Tolya is alive, but seriously wounded in the army hospital of Saratov, and decides to take the ferry across the Volga. Chapter 21 moves to Ufa, a village in Ukraine, at the home of local party secretary Dementiy Getmanov where a few friends have come to see him off after he has been appointed commissar to a tank corps at the front. He spent several years in Ukraine and married a Ukrainian woman, Galina. He worked in the security apparatus and his friends are Sagaydak, who works for the propaganda agency, and Mashuk, Who works for state security. Getmanov digs up information about the command of the tank corps, Novikov. The friends gossip that Novikov intends to marry Krymov's ex-wife Yevgenia (Lyudmila's younger sister). Galina's brother Nikolay makes the mistake of gossiping that Stalin's son Yakov has been captured by the Germans and is collaborating with them, something that is not supposed to be discussed especially by party members. Getmanov's 4-year old son defaces a picture of Stalin, he is alarmed. Chapter 23 moves to Kuibyshev (aka Samara), were Lyudmila's younger sister Yevgenia Shaposhnikova lives, sharing a room with a their old sweet German nanny Jenny, who worked for many years for their family, Shaposhnikov, and she's nostalgic about tsarist times. It is a cramped apartment with all sort of refugees from Moscow because Kuibyshev has become the temporary capital of Russia. Jenny now takes care of the sick mother of a dentist. One day Jenny is arrested and deported with all Germans. People gossip that Yevgenia turned Jenny in to get the room all to herself. Yevgenia thinks of her ex-husband Krymov more often than about her lover Novikov. She is illegal there because she keeps being refused the residence permit: her boss needs a formal request to write a certificate of her employment status and the bureaucrat in charge of residence permits refuses to make the request but asks for the certificate. She's forced to stand in line many hours pointlessly. One day she meets an intellectual from Moscow, Limonov, who is fond of her mother Alexandra, as well as a new tenant, Vladimir Shargorodsky, an old intellectual from an aristocratic family who was exiled by both the tsars and the communists for his unusual ideas. He is an unpublished poet. The two intellectuals become friends despite competing for her heart. Chapter 26 follows Lyudmila on the boat to Kuibyshev. She keeps thinking of her first husband who is Tolya's father, on the way to the Saratov hospital. The boat continues to Saratov. Arriving there, she witnesses acts of cruelty and selfishness by ordinary Russians Indifferent to the soldiers who have sacrificed for the homeland. Tolya is already dead. She visits the tomb and almost goes crazy of grief. Back home she worries Viktor because she behaves like she's expecting someone. Chapter 35 moves to the northern forest where pilot Viktorov is a member of a fighter squadron that is getting ready to join the fight. We meet the young Jewish pilot Korol and Mukhin, who was almost executed for a rape he didn't commit by heartless commissar Berman. Chapter 39 moves to a Soviet gulag, one of the many labor camps where prisoners contribute to the war effort by mining, logging, etc. Lyudmila's first husband Anatoly Abarchuk (Tolya's father) has been there since the Great Purge of 1937, sentenced to ten years. He was wrongly imprisoned but is still loyal to the party. Tolya doesn't have his surname because Abarchuk didn't want his son to be handicapped as the son of an "enemy of the people". Abarchuk left Lyudmila. Political prisoners share the with common thieves and foreign spies. Abarchuk has to work with a vicious criminal, Barkhatov, who is feared by everybody. When Barkhatov kills one of Abarchuk's friends, Abrasha Rubin (who had refused to put Barkhatov on the sick list), Abarchuk is the only one who dares denounce him, even if Barkhatov and his thugs will certainly take revenge. Abarchuk is briefly reunited with his old ideological teacher Magar, who is sick. Magar tells Abarchuk that he doesn't believe in communism anymore and that they created the monster that imprisoned them. Abarchuk is horrified by his teacher's rejection of communism. Magar later hangs himself. Chapter 43 introduces Sofya Levinton, the Jewish physician who was captured in Stalingrad together with Mostovskoy. She is traveling in a cattle wagon with other Jews towards a death camp in Ukraine. She thinks of her friends Alexandra and Yevgenia. One of the prisoners is a traumatized six-year-old boy, David, who has no relative on the train. His mom was abandoned by his father. Her mom sent him to spend the summer with his grandmother in Ukraine. His mom was schoolmate with the local librarian, Musya (whom we know is now living in a ghetto). Grossman describes work at the gas chambers from the viewpoint of a German accountant who simply counts corpses. Grossman also discusses totalitarian states and how they enforce and obtain obedience from the masses. He draws a parallel between Stalin's massacres of 1937 and Hitler's find a solution of 1942. Chapter 52 moves back to the Urals where Novikov, commander of the tank corps, and commissar Getmanov are preparing to depart for the front. Novikov Is only a colonel, but general Nyeudobnov, who is mostly a politician, is his subordinate, at least for as long as there is real fighting. To reach the front, they have to travel through Kuybyshev and Novikov hopes to see again Yevghenia. She got married three six years earlier and was already in love with her before. Chapter 54 returns to Stalingrad where Krymov has been giving lectures. He visits Batyuk's division and meets the famous sniper Zaitsev. Krymov is uncomfortable with the tales of snipers killing German workers. Krymov too thanks of Yevgenia. Krymov visits divisional general Guryev. The teenager Katya is the radio operator at the strategic house 6/1 held by Grekov's men. She had a poor childhood raised by a single mother abandoned by her father. House 6/1 is strategic because it overlooks the German camp. Vasya Klimov is Grekov's scout. One day the Russians are shocked see the Germans burning alive an old gypsy woman and her grandchild. They shoot at the Germans and kill them all. Klimov rescues a kitten that Katya adopts. It is obvious to Grekov that the Germans are preparing to attack House 6/1 and that his Russian superiors are not going to help his unit. One day general Krylov at headquarters is informed that the soldiers of 6/1 dug a tunnel to a tractor factory and he demands to talk to someone, so Grakov sends Seryozha Shaposhnikov, Dmitry's son i.e. Yevgenia's nephew. He's a kid who has been embedded with 6/1 and admires Grekov and the other heroic soldiers. The soldiers are humble workers in contrast with the intellectuals of Alexandra's circle that he grew up with. He feels that Alexandra underestimated workers, who have their own intellectual conversations all the time. Chapter 61 moves to a Stalingrad central power station, heroically held by a unit led by Stepan Spiridonov, the husband of Alexandras middle daughter Marusya (brother-in-law to Victor Shtrum and Nikolay Krymov). Marusya drowned in the Volga during the evacuation of Stalingrad. He realizes the importance of the power station to maintain electricity for the factories and military posts, even though it is under constant German bombing. His daughter Vera refuses to leave the dangerous post because she keeps hoping that Viktorov will return: she's pregnant of his child. Stepan and Vera haven't heard from Yevgenia (Vera's aunt), Lyudmila and Alexandra and don't know the fate of cousins Tolya and Seryozha. Chapter 62 returns to Kazan, where Viktor, Lyudmila and Alexandra continue their techno-scientific life. Viktor's experiments keep failing. He works with Pyotr Sokolov, who is a better mathematician. Viktor, the Tartar translator Akhmet Karimov (Who doesn't have news of his wife and daughter, stranded in Crimea), Sokolov's brother-in-law Leonid Madyarov, who is a historian, and Sokolov's landlord Vladimir Artelev, who is a Chemical engineer, meet at Sokolov's place and discuss politics in front of Sokolov's wife Marya (Lyudmila's best friend). Madyarov openly criticizes the totalitarian communist state, angering Sokolov who is a devout communist. Both Artelev and Viktor join in criticizing communism. Later, however, Karimov points out to Viktor that Madyarov was arrested in 1937 (the great purges) and then released, a rarity, which makes Karimov suspect he may be an informer. Viktor may have just compromised himself. Chapter 65 moves to the Kalmyk steppe and the Caspian Sea. Darensky is sent On a mission to inspect troops deployed in that remote corner of Russia via a very long journey. Chapter 67 returns to the German concentration camp where Yershov, Mikhail Mostovskoy and Osipov are held prisoners. Chernetsov the Menshevik who spent 20 years in exile argues that Lenin destroyed democracy, points out to the 1939 pact with Hitler and to the invasion of the Baltic States. However he gets angry with a Russian prisoner who wants to join Andrei Vlasov (a Soviet official captured by the Germans who had defected and formed the Russian Liberation Army to fight the Soviet Union). Keyze is an amoral German burglar who enjoys killing prisoners on behalf of the medical director. He only respects Yershov. Yershov, a charismatic fiercely patriotic commander who had become a hero in the war despite what Stalin had done to his family: Yershov's father was denounced as a kulak, his family's property was seized, his father, mother and sisters died in gulags (page 316 "the death camps where his father, mother and sisters had perished"). Yershov himself, as the son of a kulak, was barred from attending the military academy and had to take a humble job until the war broke out. Yershov confides to Mostovskoy his plan to start an armed underground resistance across nationalities and across all camps: the Russian Liberation Army. He needs Mostovskoy because Mostovskoy speaks many languages. Yershov despises general Gudz but trusts Osipov. Gudz, prompted by Osipov, warns Mostovskoy that Yershov is icompetent. Gudz and Osipov are worried that Yershov has begun enrolling prisoners in his Russian Liberation Army. Osipov reveals to Mostovskoy That he has formed his own underground organization and doesn't trust Yershov because Yershov is the son of a kulak. Osipov takes orders from a prisoner named Kotikov, who operates as the self-appointed political commissar of the camp. Ikonnikov has been taken away by the Germans after refusing to work on the construction of a new gas chamber. Knowing that he was going to be executed, Ikonnikov entrusted his manifesto to Mostovskoy. But now the papers have disappeared. Mostovskoy knows that he is in trouble: someone reported him to the Germans. Sure enough he gets escorted by German guards to face an interrogation, And he thinks it's because of those papers. Part 2 Novikov arrives in Kuibyshev and rushes to Yevgenia Shaposhnikova. Yevghenia is happy to see him but feels sorry for her former husband Krymov, who now has nobody to return to. Yevgenia stopped loving Krymov because he had no compassion for human suffering. She tells Novikov then she'll go back to Krymov if Krymov gets arrested or crippled. Novikov dreams of their future married life. Novikov boards the train with general Nyeudobnov, who is obsessed with kulaks and saboteurs, and commissar Getmanov. It is now clear that they are headed for Stalingrad to start the counter-offensive. Getmanov seems to know everything that Novikov does, and warns him against getting involved with Yevgenia because her brother was prosecuted in the Great Purges of 1937. Novikov snaps, exasperated by the politicians' obsession with ideological purity, and protests that this web of suspicions is senseless. While his train is leaving, Yevgenia receives a letter from her mother Alexandra informing her that Tolya is dead. Chapter 6 returns to Kazan, where Viktor finally has the idea to revise his scientific theory. It's the triumph of his career. He spends all his time at home working on the equations. He tells Lyudmila but she can't grasp his excitement. Then he tells Sokolov who perfectly understands the importance of his new theory and congratulate him and even cries, but Viktor perceives also envy. Sokolov has decided to cancel their salon after an argument with Madyarov. The scientists get notified that they are about to be sent back to Moscow, but Viktor's assistant Anna points out that Jews like her are not included. Karimov pays a visit to Viktor. Now that the war is going better for Russia he hopes to see his wife again. He describes atrocities against the Jews that has he learned from the front. Later Madyarov warns Viktor that Karimov might be an informer as many of his friends ended up in gulags but Karimov himself never did. The matriarch Alexandra has news about her son Dmitry/Mitya (the one who was arrested during the purges as an "enemy of the people") from someone who spent seven years in a gulag for a misspelling Stalin's name: Mitya is sick and knows that he will not leave the gulag alive. He describes the horrors of the gulags to Alexandra who relates them to Lyudmila, Viktor and Nadya. Nadya openly accuses Stalin of genocide and Viktor yells at her. But Lyumila reminds Viktor then Nadya learned to criticize the state from him. Nadia detects hypocrisy in her father's attitude: he criticized the state when Russia was losing the war but now doesn't want the state criticized because Russia is winning the war. So in a few pages we are told of the atrocities in both the German concentration camps and the Russian gulags. Chapter 10 to the German side of Stalingrad. The severely wounded German officer Peter Bach is taken to a crowded field hospital behind the front lines. A former artist, Before the war he hated Hitler, but now he obeys the orders. He is in love with a Russian nurse, Zina. General Paulus in the bunker is planning a massive attack on the tractor factory. Paulus doubts Hitler's strategy: he doesn't see Stalingrad so strategic. Chapter 13 returns to Darensky who is now inspecting troops in the desert near the Caspian Sea. At the beginning of his career he was discriminated because his family was aristocratic. His wife left him five years earlier. But now he has been promoted. He meets with local general Bova who criticizes the bureaucracy and Darensky agrees. Chapter 14 returns to the German concentration camp. Mostovskoy is kept in isolation for three weeks and then taken to face an SS officer named Liss. Mostovskoy thinks he is going to be interrogated and tortured. Instead, Liss gives him a lecture (in Russian) about the ultimate identity of Nazism and Stalinism. Mostovskoy desperately wants to refute Liss, but deep inside he knows that Stalin's purges and gulags are very similar to what Hitler is doing. Liss returns Ikonnikovs essay to Mostovskoy, who finally reads it: it's a philosophical essays about the essence of good, nothing to do with politics Although he attacks the idea that good can be defined by a state. Good is spontaneous acts of human kindness performed by ordinary people. Chapter 16 returns to house 6/1, completely surrounded by the Germans. Seryozha and the dirty, lice-ridden Katya become lovers. Grekov is jealous and is planning to send Seryozha on a suicidal mission but instead send both away, basically saving their lives. Krymov is dispatched to 6/1 to restore ideological order having been informed that Grekov tolerates and encourages anti-Soviet sentiment. Krymov uses an underground tunnel to reach the encircled house, and then confronts Grekov, technically a hero who has resisted the Germans, but politically a public enemy. Hrymov gets exasperated by Grekov's indifferent attitude. His men are equally annoyed by ideological talks. Luckily for him, Krymov his wounded and immediately transported back. So when Paulus' Germans attack, neither Seryozha nor Krymov are at house 6/1. Byerezkin, The commander at the tractor factory, has been wounded and his young orderly Glushkov leads the defense. Grekov and all his men are killed. The scout Klimov and the old Polyakov also survive because Grekov send them out with an excuse. Chapter 24 follows Viktor, Lyudmila and Nadya as they arrive at Moscow. The Sokolovs too. Viktor is now a celebrity among scientists thanks to his scientific discovery. But the atmosphere changes abruptly when a famous geneticist is arrested, evoking specters of 1937. Viktor's friend and teacher Dmitry Chepyzhin is forced to resign and retire, and an incompetent scientist, Aleksey Shishakov, is chosen to replace him, and another so-so scientist, Kovchenko, is chosen as deputy director. Viktor openly criticizes this event, but quickly realizes that fellow scientists, starting with Sokolov, are afraid of discuss it. The atmosphere feels like 1937 all over again and it makes Viktor even angrier. Viktor remembers the colleagues who were arrested back then because suspected of being anti-revolutionaries, and Viktor thinks they had one thing in common: they were all innocent. Chapter 28 returns to the German concentration camp. Liss is assigned a mission: to inspect a new improved extermination camp that is being built by engineers, chemists and architects. The Germans have applied the principle of the assembly chain to the extermination of Jews, an assembly chain that turns human bodies into fertilizer. We are introduced to Germany's highly efficient (if senseless) bureaucratic war machine that relies on top-notch scientists and companies. Liss meets Adolf Eichmann (a grotesque lunch in the gas chamber being built). Eichmann is the Nazi official in charge of organizing the practicalities of the "Final Solution". Liss asks Eichmann how many Jews are going to be killed and Eichmann replies "millions", a number that shocks even the hardened Liss. Chpater 33 returns to the Kalmyk steppe where Novikov, Nyeudobnov and Getmanov are summoned by supreme commander Andrey Yeremenko. Getmanov has worked with Nikita Khrushchev, and Nyeudobnov worked with another politician. Yeremenko reminds Novikov that he, Novikov, is the soldier who will have to do the real fighting. in fact, Novikov has been thinking that the incompetent Nyeudobnov is as dangerous as the enemy. Chapter 36 follows Krymov who, released from the hospital, travels to the the Akhtuba river and is ready to brief general Teshcheyev, but he finds that nobody is interested in hearing the conditions of Stalingrad. The headquarters are just full of bureaucrats. Krymov is convinced that Grekov shot him deliberately to get rid of him. Krymov writes a damning denunciation of Grekov but nobody cares and then Krymov learns that Grekov has died. Meanwhile, Krymov is surprised to be demoted. He is sent back to Stalingrad but removed from the duty of delivering the speech celebrating the 25th anniversary of the October Revolution. Instead, his old comrade Pryakhin, who has become a loyal mouthpiece for Stalin, delivers the speech, and then he avoids Krymov. Krymov looks up Spiridonov, who tells him of Marusya's dead. But Krymov only wants news of Yevgenya: he is still obsessed with her. At night Krymov thinks of Lenin, of how Lenin's comrades were later tried and forced to 'confess" by Stalin's regime. Krymov is ashamed that he didn't stand up for the friends who were unjustly accused and arrested. He wonders why nobody defended those men. His old comrade Mostovskoy too was silent. Krymov is haunted by Grekov's insubordination: fundamentally, Grekov was right. Chapter 39 Back to the German camp, Mostovskoy, still in confinement, is allowed to the bathhouse and meets Osipov, who has obtained a job there. Osipov tells him that prisoners working in German factories are stealing and stockpiling weapons. Osipov has managed to get Yershov transferred to another concentration camp: even in the camps there are purges of ideologically ambiguous communists. Osipov also tells Mostovskoy that Ikonnikov has been executed by the Germans for refusing to work on the construction of a new gas chamber. Chapter 41 moves inside the compound of the gas chamber. A humble soldier named Roze is in charge of managing the gas chamber. He is not comfortable seeing the Jews being killed and dislikes the Russian prisoners who accepted to work there. He is rewarded handsomely with a bag of gold teeth taken from the Jews. Kaltluft is the German officer in charge of the complex. He is a scrupulous manager, who eventually will kill 590 thousand Jews. Wagons carry a new load of Jews to be incinerated. That includes Sofya and little David. Sofya is behaving like a mother to David. The Germans save the doctors, but Sofya refuses to identify herself as a doctor and therefore chooses to be killed with David. The Jews are taken to the bathhouse, then to the gas chamber, then gased. Roze is the last German whom Sofya sees. Chapter 50 moves to a small Ukrainian village. The Russian soldier Semyonov was arrested with Sofya and Mostovskoy. He was abandoned by the Germans in that village because he was so sick that they assumed he would die. Instead a local woman, Khristya, took care of him and he recovered. He now lives among Ukrainians and learns of the famine of 1930 that killed millions, and for the Ukrainians was worse than this war. Chapter 51 returns to Moscow, where Viktor has become a celebrity for his theory of nuclear energy. However, Viktor's new superior, Shishakov, does not invite him to an important political meeting, refuses to allow Viktor's Jewish assistant Anna Weisspapier to move to Moscow, fires one of Viktor's trusted assistants, and refuses to hire Viktor's favorite scientist, also a Jew, Landesman. Sokolov, who attended the meeting, warns Viktor that politicians view his scientific theory as contradicting Lenin's materialism just when they are out to enforce Party's discipline in science. Viktor is outraged. He is also asked to fill a questionnaire that basically aims at assessing the probability of his party loyalty. He does not hesitate to write that is a Jew, raised in a bourgeois family, a white-collar worker, and married to a woman whose brother (Dmitry/Mitya) and first husband were arrested by the Soviet police. Viktor confronts Shishakov and threatens to resign: Shishakov accepts his resignations. Back home he tells Lyudmila, but Lyudmila has another problem: their daughter Nadya had been seeing a Russian soldier, Andryusha Lomov, every night past curfew. Lyudmila saw them kissing. Viktor pretends to be angry at Nadya but it is obvious that his mind is more worried about the lab. Lyudmila senses it and resents it. Her mother Alexandra writes a letter. This reminds her that, after Marusya's death, Stepan Spiridonov is a widower and Vera is a homeless orphan. And Dmitry's son Seryozha is lost somewhere at the front. Alexandra writes that she's worried about Yevgenya who is troubled by something and may move to Moscow (we know it's because of Krymov). Viktor takes a walk with Sokolov's wife Marya, who always secretly admired him, and they kiss. Chapter 57 shows that Darensky is getting bored in the Kalmyk steppe: his mission is completed, there is no war, and he is afflicted with lice. Then suddenly war erupts all around him. Unbeknownst to him, Stalin has order the counteroffensive and war rages on all fronts. A telegram from headquarters order him to join Novikov's regiment as it is advancing toward Stalingrad. Chapter 60 shows the devastation of Stalingrad. Spiridinov, director of the central power station, presides over a bunch of ruins after a German air raid. He waits a few days for orders from headquarters, then decides to leave and cross the Volga to rejoin his daughter Vera. He abandons his post just one day before Stalin orders the counteroffensive, and therefore from hero he goes to be considered a coward. Vera is pregnant on a barge full of refugees. She gives birth to a son and sends a message to Viktorov, the father of the baby. Spiridinov arrives after two days to meet daughter and grandchild. What they don't know is that Viktorov has died in an air battle. PART 3 Krymov gets arrested out of the blue just before the start of the counteroffensive. He is transported to the feared Lubyanka Prison in Moscow where so many of his old friends had been imprisoned in 1937, including Yevgenia's brother Dmitry and Lyudmila's first husband Abarchuk, all of them innocent, all of them forced to sign a confession (Abarchuk confessed that he had planned to assassinate Stalin). Krylov is locked in a cell with three other prisoners: Bogoleev, an art historian; Dreling, a sick old Jewish Menshevik who has spent two decades in prisons; Katsenelenbogen, another Jew and ironically a former Chekist (secret police official) who had sent hundreds of "enemies of the people" to gulags, including some of Krymov's friends, and personally led the construction of a gulag in the Arctic. The four represent the tragic, absurd wave of bourgeois, intellectuals, loyal communists and even apparatchik committed to Stalins prisons for no reason. Katsenelenboge advises Krymov to help the interrogator do his job, the job being to find that Krymov is guilty. Krymov, abandoned by his wife, feels lonely. In chapter 7 the Soviet forces attack the Germans from all directions except from the south (Novikov's tanks). Chapter 20 moves to the Kremlin where Stalin has ordered the counteroffensive and is eagerly waiting for reports from the generals. Nobody can explain by Novikov's tanks are not moving. Then we move to the battlefield where Novikov has decided to delay his tanks until the artillery clears the path, otherwise his young men would be decimated by the Germans. He makes Stalin wait for eight minutes but the result is that his assault ends with minimal casualties. Getmanov and Novikov congratulate him for his military genius, but later Getmanov writes a report about Novikov delaying the attack for eight minutes. Chapter 16 takes us the forest at the border between Prussia and Lithuania where Hitler takes a walk alone, meditating about the hated Stalin. Grossman imagines that for a second Hitler is horrified at the thought of the crematoria that are burning Jews. The victory at Stalingrad fuels Russian nationalism. It also somehow makes sense of Stalin's cruel policies of the last 20 years: collectivization, industrialization and the purges of 1937, each of which caused thousands of deaths. Chapter 20: Viktor is singled out by an article that condemns scientists who put themselves ahead of the collective. News of the victory at Stalingrad sweeps Moscow. Sokolov advises Viktor to confess, but Viktor is determined not to confess to something that is ridiculously false. Chepyzhin returns to Moscow and Viktor is eager to meet him, but the old scientist has become a utopian philosopher convinced that man some day will be even better than God while Viktor only sees evil triumphing everywhere. Yevgenia arrives unexpected, to be near Krymov who is imprisoned in Moscow. Yevgenia explains that Krymov is accused of Trotzkyism. Krymov only told her of his sympathy for Trotzky and Yevgenia only mentioned it to Novikov... Yevgenia queues up at the prison with many other women and fills the form to visit her husband. Meanwhile, Shishakov summons the scientists at a meeting at which everybody expects Viktor to confess. Instead, Viktor decides to defiantly stay home. He is happy that Marya visits him but Marya tells him that Sokolov is forbidding her to see Viktor ever again, and Marya feels guilty towards Lyudmila anyway. Yevgenia meets Marya and guesses that Marya is in love with Viktor. Yevgenia instead doesn't like Marya. Viktor assumes that Sokolov too spoke against him at the meeting. Viktor is now convinced that he will be arrested. Chapter 28. Darensky now witnesses the material and moral miseries of the defeated Germans in Russia. He enjoys the justice of Russians being free and happy while the German soldiers are captive and desperate. But when a Russian officer abuses a German prisoner, Darensky defends the German and threatens to file a report again the officer. Darensky meets Novikov, who is ecstatic about the victory and is certain that Yevgenia is on her way to visit him and marry him. Darensky is instead intimidated by commissar Getmanov. He then recognizes Nyeudobnov as the Chekist who interrogated and tortured him in 1937. Chapter 30 returns to Alexandra, still living in poverty in Kazan. She receives three letters. Lyudmila in Moscow is depressed because Tolya is dead, Viktor is in trouble, and Nadya is rebellious. Yevgenia in Kuybyshev writes that she has to go to Moscow. Vera in Leninsk writes that her father has been interrogated and has been sent back to Stalingrand to rebuild the central power station, and she is following him there with the baby. Karimov visits Alexandra. He is worried about Viktor. He tells Alexandra that Madyarov has disappeared. Karimov has been interrogated about Krymov and Yevgenia, and doesn't know why. Chapter 31 Now the novel turns to the German troops that are surrounded in a pocket of Stalingrad by the Russians after the fall of the city. German general Paulus has moved his headquarters to a cellar. Paulus would like to surrender in order to save the lives of his soldiers, but Hitler has ordered to fight to the last man. Peter Bach is one of his soldiers and Bach continues his love story with the Russian nurse Zina. Chapter 39. Yevgenia in Moscow makes friends among the women who stand in live at the prison hoping to be able to communicate with their husbands or fathers or brothers. One day finally the authorities accept the parcel that Yevgenia has been trying to send to Krymov. She is happy knowing that finally Krymov will know that he is not alone. Yevgenia also chats with Nadya and realizes that Nadya and her boyfriend have no ideals and no morality: they don't believe in anything. Viktor is at home, waiting restlessly for his destiny to be decided. He learns that actually Sokolov did not speak at all at Shishakov's meeting. Chapter 41. Viktor is becoming paranoid, suspecting that everybody is spying on him. Then out of the blue Stalin person phones in. Stalin only speaks for a few minutes but it's enough to completely change Viktor's fortunes. Viktor has always disliked the cult of personality around Stalin, but now he is proud that Stalin appreciates his work. Meanwhile, Marya calls to tell Viktor that she told her husband Sokolov that she's in love with him but also promised never to see him again. Chapter 42. Krymov is finally interrogated. The interrogator has a huge file that has all details of his life. He even knows of Krymov's past affair with the wife of a friend, before he met Yevgenia. Krymov realizes that everybody is an informer: the state collects information from everybody, and even information that seems totally harmless can become suspicious under different circumstances. He is asked to confess that he is a saboteur and a spy. He refuses, reminding the interrogator that he is a communist hero. He is tortured, but still refuses to sign a confession. Because they know his exact words about Trotsky, words that only Yevgenia heard, he suspects that Yevgenia is the one who denounce him. (We know that Yevgenya told Novikov who told Getmanov, hence Getmanov most likely denounced Krymov). Chapter 44. Paulus realizes Hitler's madness. The whole Russian campaign has made no sense. Now Hitler is asking him to resist although there is no hope for his troops. Hitler promotes him to field marshal, hoping that this will increase Paulus' commitment to die for the homeland, but the following day Paulus surrenders to the Russians. Tens of thousands of Germans and Rumanians are captured. Chapter 49. Novikov is leading his tank corps toward Ukraine, with a good chance that his troops will be the first Soviet troops to liberate Ukraine. Getmanov and Nyeudobnov are excited about the prospect, but Novikov decides to delay the offensive by 12 hours because his men need some rest and the air cover is not sufficient. Another reason is that he is still expecting Yevgenia to reach him. Getmanov gets furious at the delay and threatens to report Novikov to Moscow. Novikov doesn't care. Getmanov telegraph general Yeremenko who orders to ignore Novikov's order and to press on toward Ukraine. Meanwhile, Novikov receives a letter from Yevgenia in which she bids farewell. Three weeks later, after Ukraine is successfully liberated, Novikov is summoned to Moscow. Chapter 52. Everybody at the scientific institute is happy that Viktor returns to work and has been cleared. Nobody feels ashamed that they had stopped talking to him or even treated him like a criminal. Anna Weisspapier is finally allowed to move from Kazan to Moscow. Landesman is finally hired. Viktor can continue his research in absolute freedom. The state has realized the importance of theoretical physicists. Sokolov instead asks to be transferred to another lab, in order to avoid contact with Viktor, after learning of Marya's love for him. Viktor is happy to hear that Sokolov too is being awarded a prize for his research. Yevgenia returns to Kuybyshev. but Viktor's troubles are not over. Lyudmila guesses that Viktor loves Marya, which creates an uncomfortable atmosphere at home. And Shishakov demands that Viktor signs a letter denouncing scientists whom Viktor knows are innocent, simply because western media are making a big deal that scientists are being incarcerated in the Soviet Union. Viktor initially resists, but then, tired of fighting the state and afraid of losing Stalin's trust, signs the letter. He then learns that both Sokolov and Chepyzhin refused to sign: from now on he will be persecuted not by the state but by his own friends. Chapter 56. Krymov is still being tortured in the Lubyanka prison and still refuses to sign a confession. His cellmate Katsenelenbogen, the former Chekist, talks about the serial executions of 1937. Instead of being horrified by what he witnessed, Katsenelenbogen now thinks that the gulags are the future of humanity. Gulag prisoners built roads, dams, railways. In the future the gulags will merge with the towns and will be able to also exploit the scientists and the intellectuals. Katsenelenbogen accepts his own unfair arrest as a logical continuation of the system that he helped build. In a long monologue Katsenelenbogen justifies state terror as a first step towards a new utopia. The gulags constitute a higher stage of society. Krymov thinks that his arrest is a mistake made by the system. Katsenelenbogen thinks that their arrest by the state machine is perfectly rational. Krymov realizes that Katsenelenbogen has gone mad. Krymov however receives Yevgenia's parcel and that's enough to make him cry of joy. Chapter 58 Stepan Spiridonov and his daughter Vera are in Stalingrad (living together with Spiridonov's former worker Pavel Andreyev and Andreyev's daughter-in-law Natalya, a former nurse like Vera and Vera's best friend), but Spiridonov is being transferred to a smaller power station in the Urals. He has been spared a trial and this is his punishment for abandoning his post before the counteroffensive. Alexandra visits from Kazan because she wants to see the ruins of her old house. She's happy to see her granddaughter Vera. Alexandra travels with Spiridonov and Vera up to Kuybyshev. There are no news of Seryozha (although it should be obvious that he died with everybody else in House 6/1). Spiridonov and Vera then continue their journey to the Urals. The final chapter is devoted to ordinary people in the Russian countryside who are trying to rebuild their lives among the ruins: an elderly landlady, a wounded army officer, his wife and their young daughter. Characters
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