The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-1956 - Softcover

Solzhenitsyn, Aleksandr Isaevich

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0060803452 ISBN 13: 9780060803452

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1989

Synopsis

Drawing on his own incarceration and exile, as well as on evidence from more than 200 fellow prisoners and Soviet archives, Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn reveals the entire apparatus of Soviet repression -- the state within the state that ruled all-powerfully.

Through truly Shakespearean portraits of its victims -- men, women, and children -- we encounter secret police operations, labor camps and prisons; the uprooting or extermination of whole populations, the "welcome" that awaited Russian soldiers who had been German prisoners of war. Yet we also witness the astounding moral courage of the incorruptible, who, defenseless, endured great brutality and degradation. The Gulag Archipelago 1918-1956 -- a grisly indictment of a regime, fashioned here into a veritable literary miracle -- has now been updated with a new introduction that includes the fall of the Soviet Union and Solzhenitsyn's move back to Russia.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

Solzhenitsyn's gripping epic masterpiece, the searing record of four decades of Soviet terror and oppression, in one abridged volume, authorized by the author

About the Author:

ALEKSANDR SOLZHENITSYN (1918-2008) was born in Kislovodsk, Russia. A twice-decorated captain in the Soviet Army, he was stripped of his rank, arrested, and convicted for privately criticizing Stalin in 1945. Exiled from the USSR in 1974, he eventually settled in the United States before returning to his homeland twenty years later after the Soviet system had collapsed. Among his acclaimed works are the novels One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and The First Circle. His literary awards include the Nobel Prize for Literature and the Medal of Honor for Literature.

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 1989
• ISBN 10: 0060803452
• ISBN 13: 9780060803452
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1