Rating: 
Summary: Hugely ambitious
Review: This historical novel is the sequel to "August 1914" and continues Solzhenitsyn's examination of Russian society prior to the Revolution. In contrast to "August 1914", the focus is upon the Russian home front rather than the military operations, and to my mind wins over "August 1914" because of that.However, this is no easy read. The book is lengthy, and very ambitious in its scope - all sections of Russian society are examined - from the peasantry to the Imperial Family. Debates in the Duma are related in some detail, and although Solzhenitsyn advises that the reader may skip those parts, I found it best not to, as references to the Duma and certain of its personalities popped up elsewhere in the narrative. Above all, the author makes heavy demands upon the reader's prior knowledge of Russian history - I could quite well imagine that the novel would defeat someone who had no background knowledge. You don't have to know the events and characters described in detail (I certainly didn't) but my very superficial knowledge did help me. I got the feeling at the end of the novel that Solzhenitsyn's ambition was at times too high - many of the stories (for example of the peasant soldier returning home from the front) I felt deserved more space than they were given - it was almost as if Solzhenitsyn said to himself, "OK, I've covered that part of society, time to move my focus elsewhere". Overall a work of immense value in that it gave me what felt like an accurate impression of Russian society in World War One - a subject of which I really knew little about in any depth.
Rating:
Summary: Hugely ambitious
Review: This historical novel is the sequel to "August 1914" and continues Solzhenitsyn's examination of Russian society prior to the Revolution. In contrast to "August 1914", the focus is upon the Russian home front rather than the military operations, and to my mind wins over "August 1914" because of that. However, this is no easy read. The book is lengthy, and very ambitious in its scope - all sections of Russian society are examined - from the peasantry to the Imperial Family. Debates in the Duma are related in some detail, and although Solzhenitsyn advises that the reader may skip those parts, I found it best not to, as references to the Duma and certain of its personalities popped up elsewhere in the narrative. Above all, the author makes heavy demands upon the reader's prior knowledge of Russian history - I could quite well imagine that the novel would defeat someone who had no background knowledge. You don't have to know the events and characters described in detail (I certainly didn't) but my very superficial knowledge did help me. I got the feeling at the end of the novel that Solzhenitsyn's ambition was at times too high - many of the stories (for example of the peasant soldier returning home from the front) I felt deserved more space than they were given - it was almost as if Solzhenitsyn said to himself, "OK, I've covered that part of society, time to move my focus elsewhere". Overall a work of immense value in that it gave me what felt like an accurate impression of Russian society in World War One - a subject of which I really knew little about in any depth.
Rating: 
Summary: Magnificent!
Review: This is not an easy read. It took me nearly a year to go through its French translation, but it was well worth it. I read it as though it were divided in three volumes. Nothing has given me a better feel for Russia shortly before the 1917 revolution and the irrationality and obsessiveness that were its background. People stopped thinking and just wanted to get rid of the Czar. What they got was much worse. A must for anybody interested in understanding Russia and the profound crisis of Western culture that reached its climax first with World War I, and later Hitler and his infernal madness.
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