In the First Circle: The First Uncensored Edition

ALEKSANDR I. SOLZHENITSYN, HARRY T WILLETTS (TRANS)

ISBN 10: 0061479012 / ISBN 13: 9780061479014

Verlag: Harper Perennial October 2009, 2009

Beschreibung

Set in a 'sharashka,' a special kind of Soviet prison reserved for the highly educated and talented prisoners lucky enough to be needed by the Soviet government, In the First Cirle is considered Solzhenitsyn's fictional masterpiece. Written in the 1950s just after Solzhenitsyn's eight years in the gulag, his nearly fatal bout with cancer, and his exile to Kazakhstan, it was originally edited by Soviet censors, who cut nine full chapters and many 'objectionable' scenes. Here for the first time is the complete, definitive edition, translated by Solzhenitsyn's most trusted translator, Harry T. Willetts. Unlike prisoners of other hard labor camps, the inmates are adequately fed and given basic, human priviledges. When a new prisoner arrives from the work camps, he thinks he has been miraculously transported to heaven: dinner includes bread and butter; shaving and reading are permitted. In response to his wonder, a long-time prisoner replies, 'No. you are, just as you were previously, in hell. But you have risen to its best and highest circle-the first circle.' Solzhenitsyn crafts a number of plausible, internally consistent characters-highly educated men discussing ideas with a freedom that was denied not only to other prisoners within the Gulag, but also to most members of Soviet society. The novel's central conflict centers on each character's decision to either aid the repressive Soviet state or refuse and risk transfer to the Siberia, and likely death. 784 pp. Bestandsnummer des Verkäufers 58562

Bibliografische Details

Titel: In the First Circle: The First Uncensored ...

Verlag: Harper Perennial October 2009

Erscheinungsdatum: 2009

Einband: Paper Back

Zustand: New

Über diesen Titel

Inhaltsangabe:

The thrilling Cold War masterwork by the Nobel Prize-winning author of The Gulag Archipelago, published in full for the first time.

"Solzhenitsyn's best novel. . . . A great and important book, whose qualities are finally fully available to English-speaking readers.” —Washington Post

Moscow, Christmas Eve, 1949.The Soviet secret police intercept a call made to the American embassy by a Russian diplomat who promises to deliver secrets about the nascent Soviet Atomic Bomb program. On that same day, a brilliant mathematician is locked away inside a Moscow prison that houses the country's brightest minds. He and his fellow prisoners are charged with using their abilities to sleuth out the caller's identity, and they must choose whether to aid Joseph Stalin's repressive state—or refuse and accept transfer to the Siberian Gulag camps . . . and almost certain death.

First written between 1955 and 1958, In the First Circle is Solzhenitsyn's fiction masterpiece. In order to pass through Soviet censors, many essential scenes—including nine full chapters—were cut or altered before it was published in a hastily translated English edition in 1968. Now with the help of the author's most trusted translator, Harry T. Willetts, here for the first time is the complete, definitive English edition of Solzhenitsyn's powerful and magnificent classic.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor:

After serving as a decorated captain in the Soviet Army during World War II, Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008) was sentenced to prison for eight years for criticizing Stalin and the Soviet government in private letters. Solzhenitsyn vaulted from unknown schoolteacher to internationally famous writer in 1962 with the publication of his novella One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich; he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1968. The writer's increasingly vocal opposition to the regime resulted in another arrest, a charge of treason, and expulsion from the USSR in 1974, the year The Gulag Archipelago, his epic history of the Soviet prison system, first appeared in the West. For eighteen years, he and his family lived in Vermont. In 1994 he returned to Russia. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn died at his home in Moscow in 2008.