The Life and Fate of Vasily Grossman by John Garrard & Carol Garrard

Author:John Garrard & Carol Garrard
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781781594049
Publisher: Pen and Sword
Published: 2015-09-20T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7

WAR AND FREEDOM

The great victory at Stalingrad determined the outcome of the war, but the unspoken conflict between the victorious people and the conquering State remained unresolved.

—Vasily Grossman, Life and Fate

THE SURVIVORS OF the Stalin period who were interviewed for this book said that incredulous shock was universal at the news of the old tyrant's death. But why should anyone have been surprised that a man of seventy-two had had a stroke? The answer is that Stalin had passed from the realm of mortality to the status of a deity. As in Egypt's Old Kingdom, postwar Soviet society was organized around a pharaoh. Central Moscow, with Lenin's mummified body in a granite mausoleum on Red Square, a wall of martyrs buried in the Kremlin wall, and a phalanx of bronze statues of the Soviet god-king, resembled a modern necropolis. Power flowed from Stalin's hands alone. His satraps enjoyed enormous privileges, but at his pleasure favors could be revoked in an instant. The effect had been to freeze Soviet society, to immobilize people in congealed stasis. Since nobody knew of Stalin's heavy drinking or of his all-too-human ailments, the public believed that he would live forever.

Now the god-king of Soviet idolatry was dead. But even in death Stalin continued to exact human sacrifice—like a pharaoh demanding that his devoted courtiers be buried with him. At Stalin's lying-in-state, enormous crowds converged on central Moscow, eager to pay their last respects. The frightened authorities, with their ingrained fear of crowds and unorganized demonstrations, blocked off streets with trucks and buses. As a result hundreds, maybe even thousands, of loyal mourners were trampled to death. But what were the deaths of such insignificant people compared to the loss of their leader? Not a single word was ever published about this catastrophic loss of life. Stalin's body was dutifully mummified and placed in the mausoleum next to Lenin. The two were nicknamed by unrepentant American diplomats, very discreetly, the “gruesome twosome” or the “cold cuts.”

Such cheerful cynicism lay beyond the horizon for most Soviet citizens, who were genuinely crestfallen. Nobody had any idea what to do next, or even whom to ask. During Stalin's lifetime, it would have been blasphemy to raise the subject of orderly succession. “How will we live now?” lamented millions of infantilized Soviet citizens, unaccustomed to thinking for themselves, waiting for answers to be provided by those who knew best. Yet the sun still rose; flowers still bloomed. And so the first stirrings of change began.

In the following months, Grossman's colleague and former friend, Ilya Ehrenburg, wrote a novel that sought to depict the climatic change creeping over Soviet society. The Thaw (Ottepel) is not a memorable piece of fiction, but its title gave a name to the period following Stalin's death and served as a metaphor of an ice age ending and green shoots struggling to emerge. Of course, ice does not melt overnight. This political thaw, like the real one that took place in the weeks following Stalin's death in late winter, was subject to occasional cold snaps.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.