Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

The only English translation authorized by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn First published in the Soviet journal Novy Mir in 1962, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich stands as a classic of contemporary literature. The story of labor-camp inmate Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, it graphically describes his struggle to maintain his dignity in the face of communist oppression. An unforgettable portrait of the entire world of Stalin's forced work camps, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is one of the most extraordinary literary documents to have emerged from the Soviet Union and confirms Solzhenitsyn's stature as "a literary genius whose talent matches that of Dosotevsky, Turgenev, Tolstoy"--Harrison Salisbury This unexpurgated 1991 translation by H. T. Willetts is the only authorized edition available, and fully captures the power and beauty of the original Russian.

Drawing on his own incarceration and exile, as well as on evidence from more than 200 fellow prisoners and Soviet archives, Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn reveals the entire apparatus of Soviet repression—the state within the state that ruled all-powerfully. Through truly Shakespearean portraits of its victims—men, women, and children—we encounter secret police operations, labor camps and prisons; the uprooting or extermination of whole populations, the welcome that awaited Russian soldiers who had been German prisoners of war. Yet we also witness the astounding moral courage of the incorruptible, who, defenseless, endured great brutality and degradation. The Gulag Archipelago 1918–1956—a grisly indictment of a regime, fashioned here into a veritable literary miracle—has now been updated with a new introduction that includes the fall of the Soviet Union and Solzhenitsyn's move back to Russia.

English, Russian (translation)

After years of living in exile, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn returned to Russia in 1994 and published a series of eight powerfully paired stories. These groundbreaking stories— interconnected and juxtaposed using an experimental method Solzhenitsyn referred to as “binary”—join Solzhenitsyn’s already available work as some of the most powerful literature of the twentieth century. With Soviet and post-Soviet life as their focus, they weave and shift inside their shared setting, illuminating the Russian experience under the Soviet regime. In “The Upcoming Generation,” a professor promotes a dull but proletarian student purely out of good will. Years later, the same professor finds himself arrested and, in a striking twist of fate, his student becomes his interrogator. In “Nastenka,” two young women with the same name lead routine, ordered lives—until the Revolution exacts radical change on them both. The most eloquent and acclaimed opponent of government oppression, Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1970, and his work continues to receive international acclaim. Available for the first time in English, Apricot Jam: And Other Stories is a striking example of Solzhenitsyn’s singular style and only further solidifies his place as a true literary giant.

In "An Incident at Krechetovka Station," a Red Army lieutenant is confronted by a disturbing straggler soldier and must decide what to do with him. "Matryona's House" is the tale of an old peasant woman, whose tenacious struggle against cold, hunger, and greedy relatives is described by a young man who only understands her after her death.

Повесть "Раковый корпус" была задумана Солженицыным летом 1954 года в Ташкенте, где после ссылки он лечился в онкологическом диспансере. Воспоминания об этом легли в основу повести. Ее герои — пациенты "ракового корпуса". Среди них люди всех социальных слоев, возрастов со всех концов необъятной страны. В их судьбах отразилось то состояние советского общества, когда, пораженное беззаконием власти, как страшной болезнью, оно получило надежду на исцеление. Позиция автора в произведении резко расходилась с официальной идеологией, поэтому опубликовать его писатель смог только за рубежом. На родине повесть была впервые издана в 1990 году.