Vremea lui Şalamov
Shalamov’s Time – De Profundis

Summary/Abstract: Varlam Shalamov’ Kolyma stories constitute not only a testimony of one of the darkest periods in history, but also a lesson of dignity for today’s Russians. The fact that in the inferno of the Stalinist camps there existed people who were not willing to pay any price in order to survive, who would rather die than be accomplice in the death of their camp mates represents for those born later both a reproach and a reason for pride and hope. Because Shalamov and others who shared his way of thinking did survive and, even more, deliberately chose to ignore death. What Shalamov considered to be the most important event of the Soviet history was not the second World War but the construction of a huge conveyor belt for destruction that brought about the appearance of a mutant human being – the new Soviet man.

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