This novel shows how the former Soviet union people fought against Germans
during the second world war to defeat Nazis. It also shows how the repressive
system of the time has jettisoned the old generation revolutionaries and gave full powers to the
new generation which carried out the orders form the top in a blind and
submissive manner to harass and punish
the people. The intellectuals including poets and scientists were promoted or pulverized and perished
according to the caprice of the authorities. In this scenario there have been
young people who defied death to defeat German aggressors. This novel has wider
canvas like Tolstoy’s War and Peace or Quiet Flows the Don by
Sholokhov. The destiny of individuals ,
families , regions , countries, communities and even nationalities is intertwined
and suffered in the maelstrom of the Second World War which too a heavy toll on humanity and
civilization. The Second big war came due to imperialistic ambitions of
Germany, the ‘appeasement policy ‘ of
Britain and France , the myopia
of Soviet Union in making a pact with Germany. The senselessness, carnage , slaying of
freedom of nationalities and the tremendous scale of horror devastated the lives of people. Human
has to search for meaning of humanity in the face of concentration camps.
We remember the fate of many
characters such as Shaposhnikov sisters, Lyudmila and Yevgenia. Lyudmila’s
husband Victor Shtrum, a nuclear physicist experiences the rise and fall of his
fame and fortunes according to the grace or resentment of the top people.
Lyudmila loses her son Tolya in war , suffers and stands by her husband through
thick and thin. Yevgenia, the bolder woman struggles for residence permit, leaves her
first husband Krymov , a commissar in Red Army for a Colonel Novikov, a
commanding officer.
Among Victor’s colleagues we find
all kinds of people-supporters( Pyotr Sokolov and Anna Loshakova, enemies such
as Shishakov, opportunists, dissentients such as Chepyzhin). Victor and his
colleagues discuss things freely away from Moscow in Kazan but later he is tormented by doubts
regarding who might have informed against him when he fell
out of favour with authorities in Moscow. He finds a genuine love for
Marya Ivanova Sokolova , the wife of his friend and who sympathizes with him in
his downfall. Victor is also consumed by guilt but his love outside wedlock
remains unfulfilled. Lyudmila understands her husband’s inner turmoil but
supports him even at the cost of her own suffering. Yevgenia who separates from
her mono-track minded and
colourless husband Krymov goes to see
him who is charged with treason in
prison . Her letter causes jealousy in her lover Novikov who is in the
thick of the battle. Krymov himself the
first generation Bolshevik overwhelmed
by bureaucratic upstarts and suspected as treacherous undergoes interrogation
and physical torture. The character
Viktor , his guilt over the death of his mother, his weakness in signing against the doctors’
plot against Stalin’s life , his love for the wife of his friend have parallels
in his personal life.
The hard life in camps run by Germans as well as
Russians is described vividly .The humanity of inmates belonging to various
nationalities. Professions , religions is denied, their dignity is compromised,
their labour is abused to dig their own graves, their rebellion is suppressed
ruthlessly. The prisoners of war suffer
more tragic experiences due to the megalomania of their respective rulers who
drove them to war in the name of nationalism. They are perished unwept and
unsung- Mostovskoy, (an old Bolshevik), Ikinnikov-Morzh( a former Tolstoyan), Chernetsov ( a former Menshevik),
Captured Russian officers such as Osipov In German camp . In Russian labour
camp – Abarchuk( Lyudmila’s former husband),Rubin ( a medical orderly),
Barkhatov ( A criminal), Magar ( an old Bolshevik and Abrchuk’s teacher ) , a
mystic called Prince Dolgoruky, a former professor of economics called Stepanov) and others. We
find the slavery in its modern incarnation here. In the face of might of State
, no forgiveness reigns where the inmates are sentenced for long periods and
arbitrarily by making them confess by force. This is a story of tiny individual
who is caught like an insect in a spider’s web. A hopeless maze.
The most poignant scenes are witnessed in
march of the innocent and hapless to the Gas
Chamber. The face of humanity is totally disfigured here. The people
hoping for resettlement are marched like lambs by the hyenas called
Nazis. Their physical possessions, , honour and
even souls are crushed and suffocated to death to write and stain pages in history in blood and tears. The reader experiences
indescribable anguish at the fall of man to the level less than that of insects
not withstanding the glorification of civilization . It is an impregnable dark chamber in the mind and heart of man.
The heroics of the fighter
squadron of the Russian Air force , soldiers in House 6/1, officers of the
Soviet army in Stalingrad bring out various facets of people involved . The
desperate search for food and water, the life in the bunkers, the sprouting of love between the young people, the
sacrificing spirit, the undying humour
amidst dance of death, the inexplicable
forgiveness by an old woman who offers
to a prisoner of war a loaf of bread instead of a brickbat , the desertion
of regions , the betrayals by some
remembering their pathetic past ,
all these create a welter of emotions and thoughts in the minds of readers.
Descriptive powers of the
novelist :
Grossman uses riveting similes.
‘’On the left , towards the Volga, were the tall chimneys of the ‘Red October’ factory and some goods wagons that
looked like a herd of animals huddled around the body oft heir dead leader- a
locomotive that was lying on its side.” (43)
A burst
of machinegun fire under the feet of
Byerozkin “was almost as though a flock of sparrows had suddenly shot up from
the ground.” ( 44)
When he was flying the breath of an old Russia from the forests
and lakes came into experience of Lieutenant Viktorov.
Ancient racks
ran among these lakes and forests; houses and churches had been built from the
tall , upright trees; the masts of sailing boast had been hewn from them . The
grey Wolf has run through these forests. Alyonushka had stood and wept on the very bank along which Viktorov was walking towards the mess . This vanished
past seemed somehow simple-minded, youthful ,naïve; not only the maidens in towers, even the grey-bearded
merchants , deacons and patriarchs seemed a thousand years younger than the worldly-wise young pilots who had come to this forest from a world of
fast-cars, machine -guns, diesel engines , radios and cinemas. The Volga
itself-quick and slim , flowing between steep, many-coloured banks , through
the green of the forest , through the patterns of light blue and red -was a
symbol of this vanished past. (143)
The novelist in the same breath
describes how the forest under his feet which had many layers sprung to
submerge him in itself. He feels at the beginning a sense of strangeness
and uncomfortable as if he were
at the bottom of a reservoir
looking up through a layer of water and observes various flies, birds and the
moss covered in dew drops. when he enters into brightness, he feels optimistic
and sense of freedom and becomes a part of nature.
The
lemon-coloured butterflies , the polished , blue-black beetles , the ants , the
grass-snake rustling through the grass, seemed to be joining together in a
common task. Birch-twigs, sprinkled with fine leaves , brushed against his face ; a grass-hopper jumped
up and landed on him as though he were a tree- trunk; it clung to his belt ,
calmly tensing its green haunches as it sat there with its round , leathery
eyes and sheep-like face
Only a great
observer with a poetic heart like Grossman who saw beauty amidst ugliness of
war could write like this.
Philosophy : Grossman’s deep understanding of human
history is described in chapter 50 of
part one. He writes that people are
whipped up into frenzy of hatred for others, voted unanimously , allowed rabies
enter their houses, kept discreet silence about mass killings, herded and
guarded prisons, obeyed a lot,
some rebelled but the vast masses succumbed to obedience. The human
spirit is paralyzed by totalitarian violence. The instinct for
self-preservation is supported in the name of
future greatness of motherland, world progress, happiness of mankind, of
a nation , of a class. The violence of totalitarian State becomes an object of
mystical worship. Blind optimism , rebellions born out of desperation, waiting for execution and believing the voice
of Jewish executioners.
Grossman refers to the rising in Warsaw ghettoes , in camps
like Treblinka and Sobidor , partisan movements in subjugated countries, the
uprisings in Berlin in 1953,Humgary ( 1956), the camps of Iberia, the riots in
Poland and students’ protests against the suppression of freedom of thought point out
the imperishable yearning for freedom. He writes “Man’s fate may make
him a slave , but his nature remains unchanged.” (220) he echoes Hemingway’s words
in his novel The Old Man and the Sea , “A man can be destroyed but not
defeated .” Grossman
writes , Man does not renounce freedom voluntarily. This conclusion holds out
hope for our time, hope for the future.”(200) He predicts that future may produce a machine with
artificial intelligence, but can it surpass man? He ends ,” Fascism annihilated
tens of millions of people.” (201)
This novel is written on an epic scale and credit
goes to the writer who has persisted with writing the novel despite no hope of
publication in his home country for two centuries. But the novel saw the light
of the day in 1985 in English translation by
Robert Chandler in the West.
The novel portrays on a wide canvas the history
of the Soviet Union , its tortuous road of development through collectivization
that affected Ukraine , atmosphere of terror due to total State surveillance,
the self-censorship and opportunism of intellectuals, the courage of some and
the destruction of many, antisemitism that has grown, the nature of totalitarianism and undying yearning
of man for freedom , the patriotic upsurge that helped defend Stalingrad and
turn the tide against Nazism. According to Linda Grant , the novel will be
famous when the readers realize that “all that matters is the individual and
the furious joy of being alive, to live as human beings and die as human beings
, not the mouthpieces of unreality.” (xviii)
This is also the philosophy of the novelist Vasily Grossman who has become
depressed over the ‘arrest’ of his book by the authorities. Robert handler
notes, ‘Life and Fate could perhaps be called a Chekhovian epic about human
nature.” (xxxiv)
The Tolstoyan question in his War and Peace
why did millions follow their leader even
to their destruction is again posed here in the context of the Second World War.
The people of the twentieth century too followed their leaders out of ignorance
and doubt killing obedience and millions perished in the service of national
chauvinism pitted against freedom and emancipation of the suppressed.
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