Skillfully portrays the bleakness of the prison system with an appreciation for the dark humor that allowed the author to...
A former prisoner recounts his years in the Soviet gulag in this memoir.
In this English translation of reminiscences originally recorded in 1970, Sokolenko shares stories from his years of imprisonment for political offenses during the Stalin regime. (A biographical note explains that Sokolenko was exonerated in 1956, when it was concluded that there was no basis for his original conviction.) The narrative does not follow Sokolenko’s imprisonment chronologically but is made up of a series of vignettes, with Sokolenko blending his own experiences into the stories of his fellow prisoners and their guards. These true stories capture both the horrific experience and bitter humor of Russia under Stalin, as committed socialists, black-market businessmen and ordinary people struggled with the changing definition of “enemy of the state.” Sokolenko’s narrative clearly demonstrates that the corruption and absurdity of the Soviet system confronted prisoners inside the gulag as well as outside—Sokolenko was often forbidden to use his agricultural experience, even though the camp was expected to grow its own food; medicinal stores of vodka were used for a prison guards’ party; a corrupt and incompetent gulag administrator was finally removed from his position, only to be reinstated because it was a crime for anyone to challenge his commitment to the socialist cause. Throughout the book, the tone is matter-of-fact, allowing the events described, rather than any elegant prose, to work on readers’ emotions. This was a wise decision by the author, who does not overwhelm the prisoners’ anecdotes with unnecessary commentary. (In contrast, the book’s footnotes, which decipher for the contemporary reader many of the names and policies Sokolenko mentions, are a useful addition, and the text could easily have accommodated more.) The result is a clear, bracing depiction, but not a maudlin one, of one of the darker chapters of modern history.
Skillfully portrays the bleakness of the prison system with an appreciation for the dark humor that allowed the author to survive it.Pub Date: Dec. 14, 2012
ISBN: 978-1475246896
Page Count: 156
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
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