One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

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Summary: a towering figure of the 20th Century
Review: One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1963) (Aleksandr Isaevich Solzhenitsyn 1918-)
Over a half century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of old people offer the
following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: "Men have forgotten God;
that's why all this has happened." Since then I have spend well-nigh 50 years working on the history
of our revolution; in the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of personal
testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing
away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as
possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some 60 million of our people,
I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: "Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has
happened."
-Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Over the course of his long and brilliant career as a gadfly to both Russia and the West, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn managed to pull off a remarkable trifecta: he was exiled by the USSR, banished from the Cold War dialogue by Western political and cultural elites and then banished from the discussion over Russia's future by the intelligencia there. He has truly made a career as a voice crying in the wilderness, launching one jeremiad after another.

In 1945, Solzehenitsyn was sent to the Gulag for ten years after writing derogatory comments about Stalin in a letter to a friend. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, as the title suggests, describes what just one day would have been like behind the barbed wire. The story is set in the forced labor camp where he was imprisoned from 1950-53. That the system that perpetrated such crimes was evil is obvious, but it is through the sheer accumulation of mundane indignities and small triumphs (over hunger, cold, ill health, etc.) that the horror of the camps is really brought home. One of the most dramatic moments in the book, nicely illustrative of the small scale but enormous stakes of the victories won, comes when Ivan manages to secrete a spoon that he had forgotten he was carrying. In the end, simply surviving this barbaric system becomes the greatest victory.

With the publication of this book, in 1962, during the brief Kruschev thaw, Solzhenitsyn became an international sensation. In 1974, when the first sections of The Gulag Archipelago were published in Paris, Solzhenitsyn was arrested, tried for treason and forced into exile, eventually settling in Vermont. I suppose folks must have expected him to be so grateful for his asylum that he would express undying gratitude to the United States. If so they underestimated the moral tenor of the man. He proved to be nearly as outspoken a critic of the West as he had been of the USSR, culminating in his 1978 Harvard Commencement speech, where first he excoriated Western intellectuals in general (...)

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Summary: Goodness does prevail
Review: The setting in which experience takes place effects the mood and quality of the experience. It's natural for most people to judge the amount of meaning is in their lives, by the quality of the setting in which they live. If this is the case, then how do people keep the will to live when the setting of their life becomes completely destitute? When one is forced to live in harsh surroundings, he will only find value in his life by keeping his will to live unbreakable, as seen in One day in the Life if Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn , when Ivan, the main character in the book is forced to live in a Stalinist work camp for eight years, and never loses his will to live .

The beginning of the book is the beginning of one day that Ivan Denisovich spends in a Stalinist work camp. The ending of his book is the ending of this same day in the camp. However he is subject to constant dehumanization by the guards he works for from the moment that he wakes up, to the moment that he goes to bed. He is expected to perform heavy physical labor, despite being deprived of any real nourishment. He lives in one of the coldest, harshest, and most evil enviroments that can be imagined, but he never gives up. Ivan never loses his will to live, even when the setting in which he is forced to live in, attemps to break him apart.

The reader might be naive to the history of the Soviet Union or may not be aware of the relationship between Stalin and the Russians. This information would be very helpful to know to further the reader's understanding of the struggles that Ivan Denisovich goes through in the book and why. It will help the reader to understand why the setting of the book is so dark. If the reader wishes to learn about The Soviet Union or the relationship between Stalin and the Russians, there is a lot of information available in most libraries. The more knowledge the reader has before the reading the book, the better they will understand the reasons that Ivan is forced to live in such a destitute enviroment.

Ivan never loses his will to live throughout the book, but he is by no means content. In the the third to last paragraph of the book, the reader senses a shift in Ivan. He is content. He is relieved to feel his unwashed blanket cover the length of his body, because this means that he has made it through another day. Until he feels that blanket cover his body, he can't be sure that he will make it through the day. The guards might kill him in his sleep but he is satasfied because he at least made it through this one day.

When the setting of one's life doesn't encourage one to thrive, he must make his will unbreakably strong. Only then will he survive. In One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Ivan is forced to live in conditions that most people don't dare to imagine. He lives in bitter cold with little food, and he is in constant danger of being killed. The setting of Ivan's life doesn't project anything that resembles goodness or hope, yet he hangs on to his will to live for one more day. The will of a person must be stronger than the conditions that they are subject to. Ivan Denisovich is a perfect example. He lives in a cold and evil Stalinist camp, yet never loses his will to live. The setting of One Day In the Life of Ivan Denisovich is in deed very dark, but the individual that is portrayed is not. Ivan is able to defy the dismal setting in which he lives, and keeps his will intact.

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Summary: Suffering in Siberia
Review: The thing that marks this work out as brilliant is the sense of inner dignity in Solzhenitsyn's protagonist. He does not dwell on self-pity; his life is pitable enough in the gulag. He does not bemoan his predicament: in fact, he recalls the story of his incarceration matter-of-factly (as a Red Army soldier he was temporarily detained behind German lines, therefore according to Stalin's twisted logic he was a spy). At one stage in the day he learns of a new law re-setting the time zone; he ingests the knowledge without undue reflection on what the outside world is doing. The very quietness of Ivan Denisovich makes him an all the more powerful witness to the disgrace of his captivity. The most dramatic moment, for me, was the prisoners' skirmishing over who would get to eat the fish-eye floating around in the disgusting "soup" served in the camp mess. Readers might care also to read Benson Bobrick's "East of the Sun", which gives the history of Siberia and informs us that Solzhenitsyn himself coined the expression "The Gulag Archipelago."

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Summary: One day can change your life
Review: One day...is that all it was? Even reading the novel, you feel the exact sameness of the days, how they all blend together in a Soviet workcamp, and how it had to be difficult to keep track of how many days have passed.

This book had a profound impact on me. These types of books make me look at myself a little differently. They make me wonder just how I define what's important in my life, and they make me awe at how easy it would be to redefine "important." For Ivan, what's important is an extra bowl of food, dry gloves, and a little tobacco. But we know, when we read this, that it wasn't what was always important--once upon a time, he had a life.
Simply by becoming a prisoner of war, he's become an enemy of the State; and a prisoner of a much larger war (Stalin's war on his people).

This book is about more than Stalin and more than a workcamp. It's about much more than a day in the life of a single prisoner. It's about humanity, about questioning who we are and what it would take to make us radically different, and yes, about communism and another world.

Read it yourself--and find out.

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Summary: Powerful, one of my favorite books
Review: I had to read "Day in the Life" over ten years ago for a russian history class. It instantly became one of my favorites. For a taste of social history in Soviet Russia, the book is unparalleled. Aside from that, the book doubles as an insightful devotional. Yes, Ivan had a horrible experience, but he lived every day to its fullest and was thankful for it.
In answer to some other reviews, yes, it is slow at times, but it is @160 pages about one day! If you're willing to be patient the book is an incredible experience.

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Summary: Humbling...
Review: Fellow reviewers on this site have spoken at length about the accuracy and historical relevance of the portrayal of the Soviet Gulag system in _One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich_. They have detailed the harsh conditions, the complex mechanics of survival in the Gulag, the terror of Stalin's government, and the 'harrowing' experiences of the zeks - the slang term for the Soviet Gulag prisoner. I concur with all of these observations, but I would like to provide the potential reader with a view from another angle.

_One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich_ is uplifting. It is a story of the transcendent quality of the human will that allows one not only to survive, but to _live_ in the most adverse of situations. The protagonist, Shukhov, shows little fear, little pain. Instead he shows that a slave laborer can retain enough dignity to show pride in his workmanship, compassion for his fellows, and a drive to carry on.

Throughout the story Shukhov is creating. He sews, builds a wall, fashions illicit tools. And though these things help ensure his survival, his ongoing occupation in these activities and his investment of himself in them shows what a basic part of humans the creative impulse is. For Shukhov, creating does not save his life, it is his life.

In this world, there are people whose words are clear and inspiring, tempered with insight gained through adversity - the kind of adversity so severe that no person would choose to place themselves amongst it. Imprisonment, danger, fear of death. Solzhenitsyn is one of these; the wisdom he offers to us has already been bought and paid for. We others are fortunate enough to be lent what these people have to offer - those who have had no choice but to be there, and have lived to write about it. And if ever we find ourselves in a similar kind of adversity, we can remember what they have taught us, and know that adversity can be endured.

Some say that life is suffering. The story of the zek shows me in suffering, there can be life. The story reminded me of how comfortable my life is and how trivial my concerns can be. The author's style and the skill of the translation (I refer to the H.T. Willetts translation, ISBN 0374521956) make this book accessible to everyone. This is fortunate, because everyone can benefit from the message to be found in _One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich_.

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Summary: Harrowing Tale of Stalin-Age Work Camps
Review: Stalin gets off easy in the annals of history for his butchery, probably because he fought with the U.S. against Hitler. But this book will make people think a little differently. Stalin was a man who killed nearly 100 million of his own people, ostensibly in the name of security, but the real reason lies in paranoia and power-hunger. This is a tragic story by a man who experienced the same thing. Solzhenitsyn spent time in a Soviet labor camp because he made a derogatory comment about Stalin. But Ivan Denisovich Shukhov's crime is even less. He is captured by Germans in World War II but escapes to Russian lines. Instead of being decorated, he is caught in one of Stalin's witch hunts and is labeled a German spy. He confesses to a crime he did not commit, and is given 10 years hard labor. One Day chronicles his life in the camp. It is a story you will not soon forget. This short volume tells of the back-breaking work, the cruel injustices, and ultimately denounces Stalin. If the book had been published ten years earlier Solzhenitsyn would most likely have been killed. But Krushchev allowed it to be published. Along with Doctor Zhivago it stands as one of the greatest pieces of Soviet Literature ever written, still as powerful today as it was when published in 1962.

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Summary: Powerful
Review: Stalin held the Soviet Union in a grip of terror from 1941 until he died (or, some are now saying, was murdered) in 1953. Among the atrocities that were always suspected were the existence of brutal Siberian prisons. In 1963, Alexander Solzhenitzyn's novel, ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH, was published in America and around the world, revealing the realities of these experiences.

As much as the book makes an important statement of the political and social conditions of the era, it is also a wonderful work of literature. In a direct, spare style, the author goes through the minutiae of daily life from the perspective of one man, the title character who is mostly called Shukhov in the book. Like the other prisoners, Shukhov is not in for crime as we define it in America; his crime was to have been unlucky enough during World War II to be taken as a POW. Another prisoner's crime was to have received a small token of appreciation after the war from a British soldier. The brutalities they experience in their prison are not those commonly associated with contemporary American incarceration. Insufficient clothing, insufficient food and insufficient bedding in a remote arctic setting are just the beginning. They have nothing else. Work on building a "community" is only called off if the temperature goes lower than 42 degrees below zero. The men are given insufficient tools and supplies but are expected under threat to complete the building process in record time. On the one hand, the author writes, your worst enemy is the man next to you because you are both scrambling for the same meager scraps. At the same time, though, the dynamics of the system require that you give your allegiance to the gang. Many of the boss jobs are given to prisoners which yields another revelation about Stalin's world: the wall between prisoner and paid staff was very thin. Another: in the brief flashbacks of life outside the prison, there are struggles and inadequacies as well, no one has it easy. And another: the prisoners have one advantage that no one else in the USSR has, the freedom to communicate candidly without threat; what else can be done to those already living the life of punishment? At the end of the day, Shukhov is thrilled: he has caged a few extra scraps of food during the day and did nothing that would cause him to be thrown into solitary confinement of which he is most afraid.

My chief test of fiction is, does the author create an airtight world, using it to explicate universal truths of the human condition? ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH succeeds brilliantly. It is very readable, much like THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA, and while it profiles a terrible life, it also emits a spirituality that arises from the specter of men who find something to be grateful for at the end of the day, even if it is an extra crust of stale bread or the fact that in the last 24 hours, they did nothing, however innocently, however not their own fault, that would get them sent to solitary confinement.

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Summary: Hate speech
Review: Since I've got a professor who advocates reading more Karl Marx, I will bend to the winds of pro-Communist Political Correctness on the College Campus and label this as Anti-Communist Hate Speech. Please have the Zampolit denounce this crap as reactionary Capitalist Running Dog doo-doo! Thank you, Tovarich!

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Summary: Stimulus to a Searching, Introspective Analysis
Review: "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" is indeed a powerful book. Were it merely the grim testimonial to life in the Soviet Gulags or a witness to infringed liberties, its force would be staggering. Were it a testimony to the indomitableness of human nature, it would be crushing. As it is, it shatters our perception of man and ourselves as no other book, save Anne Franke`s diary and the testemony of Elie Wiesl, could ever have done.

However, it is more than all the above. "One Day" is actually a searching look at human nature. The biting wind, jagged wire, frigid climate, watery soup, and the warmth provided by an extra pair of mittens or an hour of hard physical labor all find matches in the colorful crowd of characters that parades through this narrative - from the prison guards to the prisoners themselves to the prison director to the turncoat prisoners who sold their integrity for the favor of their oppressors.

This is a book to be read, first of all, for its historical value - a tribute to those who were imprisoned but whose voices were never heard, and a silent plea to commit all our forces to the proposition that such vileness will never reach our liberty-loving shores. No less importantly, this is a book that should prompt us to turn our eyes inward and question ourselves whether, in our own way, we are capable of committing the same atrocities against our fellow man, and whether, if subjected to the same suffering, we would have the strength of character to find as much comfort in a bowl of soup as we do now in the transient, unfounded knowledge that such inhumanity will not touch us.