One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

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Solzhenitsyn's first book, this economical, relentless novel is one of the most forceful artistic indictments of political oppression in the Stalin-era Soviet Union. The simply told story of a typical, grueling day of the titular character's life in a labor camp in Siberia, is a modern classic of Russian literature and quickly cemented Solzhenitsyn's international reputation upon publication in 1962. It is painfully apparent that Solzhenitsyn himself spent time in the gulags--he was imprisoned for nearly a decade as punishment for making derogatory statements about Stalin in a letter to a friend.


Review
"One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich yields, more than anything else, a beautiful sense of its author as a Chekhovian figure: simple, free of literary affectation, wholly serious."--The New Republic



Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: Russian


Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: Russian


The Merriam-Webster Encyclopedia of Literature
Short novel by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, published in Russian in 1962 as Odin den Ivana Denisovicha in the Soviet literary magazine Novy Mir, and published in book form the following year. Solzhenitsyn's first literary work--a treatment of his experiences in the Stalinist labor camps--established his reputation and foreshadowed his masterpiece, The Gulag Archipelago (1973-75). Set in the forced-labor camp in which the author was interned from 1950 to 1953, Ivan Denisovich describes a typical day in the life of an inmate. Published during Nikita Khrushchev's de-Stalinization program, the work was released without interference from Soviet government censors and Solzhenitsyn became an instant celebrity.


From the Publisher
From the icy blast of reveille through the sweet release of sleep, Ivan Denisovich endures. A common carpenter, he is one of millions viciously imprisoned for countless years on baseless charges, sentenced to the waking nightmares of the Soviet work camps in Siberia. Even in the face of degrading hatred, where life is reduced to a bowl of gruel and a rare cigarette, hope and dignity prevail. This powerful novel of fact is a scathing indictment of Communist tyranny, and an eloquent affirmation of the human spirit.


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He presents the most Karakaesque situations, the most gruesome details in a matter-of-fact manner, without exaggeration or indignation. His is a calm, stylized narrative by an extremely observant and intelligent man.-- Books of the Century; New York Times review, April 1963


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