Vasily Grossman

An NYRB Classics OriginalFew writers had to confront as many of the last century’s mass tragedies as Vasily Grossman, who wrote with terrifying clarity about the Shoah, the Battle of Stalingrad, and the Terror Famine in the Ukraine. An Armenian Sketchbook, however, shows us a very different Grossman, notable for his tenderness, warmth, and sense of fun.       After the  Soviet Government confiscated—or, as Grossman always put it, “arrested”—Life and Fate, he took on the task of revising a literal Russian translation of a long Armenian novel. The novel was of little interest to him, but he needed money and was evidently glad of an excuse to travel to Armenia. An Armenian Sketchbook is his account of the two months he spent there.       This is by far the most personal and intimate of Grossman’s works, endowed with an air of absolute spontaneity, as though he is simply chatting to the reader about his impressions of Armenia—its mountains, its ancient churches, its people—while also examining his own thoughts and moods. A wonderfully human account of travel to a faraway place, An Armenian Sketchbook also has the vivid appeal of a self-portrait.

Life and Fate is an epic tale of a country told through the fate of a single family, the Shaposhnikovs. As the battle of Stalingrad looms, Grossman's characters must work out their destinies in a world torn apart by ideological tyranny and war. Completed in 1960 and then confiscated by the KGB, this sweeping panorama of Soviet society remained unpublished until it was smuggled into the West in 1980, where it was hailed as a masterpiece. Librarian's Note: This is an alternative cover edition of ISBN13: 9780099506164

Pocas novelas hay que emocionen y conmuevan como Vida y destino, un inmenso fresco humano heredero de la mejor tradición rusa. Mientras la cruel batalla de Stalingrado desangra a los ejércitos soviéticos y alemanes, los protagonistas de esta novela, comparada con Guerra y paz o Doctor Zhivago, luchan ferozmente para sobrevivir al terror del régimen estalinista y al horror del exterminio de los judíos. El dolor de una madre obligada a despedirse de su hijo, el amor de una joven bajo los bombardeos o la pérdida de su humanidad de los soldados en el frente ante la atrocidad de la guerra son algunas de las emocionantes historias que entretejen esta novela coral que retrata como ninguna el alma del hombre del siglo XX. Vasili Grossman aspiraba quizás a cambiar el mundo con su novela y lo que es seguro es que Vida y destino le cambia la vida a quien se adentra en sus páginas.

Роман В.Гроссмана, пришедший к читателю через двадцать с лишним лет после написания, посвящен переломному моменту в истории борьбы с фашизмом - Сталинградской битве. Эпическая широта охвата событий, бесстрашие, с которым писатель поднимает самые жгучие, болевые проблемы эпохи, гуманистическая направленность и художественное мастерство - все это позволяет отнести роман к числу лучших произведений русской советской литературы.Роман В.Гроссмана, пришедший к читателю через двадцать с лишним лет после написания, посвящен переломному моменту в истории борьбы с фашизмом - Сталинградской битве. Эпическая широта охвата событий, бесстрашие, с которым писатель поднимает самые жгучие, болевые проблемы эпохи, гуманистическая направленность и художественное мастерство - все это позволяет отнести роман к числу лучших произведений русской советской литературы.

Vasily Grossman’s Life and Fate has been hailed as a twentieth-century War and Peace. However, Life and Fate is only the second half of a two-part work, the first half of which was published in 1952. Grossman wanted to call this earlier work Stalingrad—as it will be in this first English translation—but it was published as For a Just Cause. The characters in both novels are largely the same and so is the story line; Life and Fate picks up where Stalingrad ends, in late September 1942. The first novel is in no way inferior to Life and Fate; the chapters about the Shaposhnikov family are both tender and witty, and the battle scenes are vivid and moving. One of the most memorable chapters of Life and Fate is the last letter written from a Jewish ghetto by Viktor Shtrum’s mother—a powerful lament for East European Jewry. The words of this letter do not appear in Stalingrad, yet the letter’s presence makes itself powerfully felt and it is mentioned many times. We learn who carries it across the front lines, who passes it on to whom, and how it eventually reaches Viktor. Grossman describes the difficulty Viktor experiences in reading it and his inability to talk about it even to his family. The absence of the letter itself is eloquent—as if its contents are too awful for anyone to take in.

Întors acasă după 30 de ani supravieţuiţi în lagărele sovietice, Ivan Grigorievici încearcă să-şi găsească un loc în lumea în continuă transformare. Stalin a murit, iar frica pe care a instaurat-o, dispărută odată cu el, lasă loc unui haos care parcă i-a cuprins pe toţi. Aflat acum în libertate, Vania se luptă cu amintirile crimelor cumplite ale anilor ’30 şi se nedumereşte cînd întîlneşte prieteni de altădată, mulţi chinuiţi de amintirea unor „mărturii” ce lor le-au salvat viaţa, iar pe alţii i-au închis în întunecimea gulagului sovietic.

Quando Pëtr Vavilov, un giorno del 1942, vede la giovane postina attraversare la strada con un foglio in mano, puntando dritto verso casa sua, sente una stretta al cuore. Sa che l’esercito sta richiamando i riservisti. Il 29 aprile, a Salisburgo, nel loro ennesimo incontro Hitler e Mussolini lo hanno stabilito: il colpo da infliggere alla Russia dev’essere "immane, tremendo e definitivo». Vavilov guarda già con rimpianto alla sua isba e alla sua vita, pur durissima, e con angoscia al distacco dalla moglie e dai figli: «...sentì, non con la mente né col pensiero, ma con gli occhi, la pelle e le ossa, tutta la forza malvagia di un gorgo crudele cui nulla importava di lui, di ciò che amava e voleva. Provò l’orrore che deve provare un pezzo di legno quando di colpo capisce che non sta scivolando lungo rive più o meno alte e frondose per sua volontà, ma perché spinto dalla forza impetuosa e inarginabile dell’acqua». È il fiume della Storia, che sta per esondare e che travolgerà tutto e tutti: lui, Vavilov, la sua famiglia, e la famiglia degli Šapošnikov – raccolta in un appartamento a Stalingrado per quella che potrebbe essere la loro «ultima riunione» –, e gli altri indimenticabili personaggi di questo romanzo sconfinato, dove si respira l’aria delle grandi epopee... E se Grossman è stato definito «il Tolstoj dell’Unione Sovietica», ora possiamo finalmente aggiungere che Stalingrado, insieme a Vita e destino, è il suo Guerra e pace.