Apricot jam : and other stories
Record details
- ISBN: 9781582436029 :
-
Physical Description:
print
375 p. ; 24 cm. - Publisher: Berkley, Calif. : Counterpoint LLC, 2011.
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Subject: | Solzhenit︠s︡yn, Aleksandr Isaevich -- 1918-2008 -- Translations into English Soviet Union -- Fiction Russia (Federation) -- Fiction |
Available copies
- 3 of 3 copies available at BC Interlibrary Connect.
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- 0 current holds with 3 total copies.
Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Holdable? | Status | Due Date |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Fernie Heritage Library | FIC SOL (Text) | 35136000290636 | Adult Fiction | Volume hold | Available | - |
Prince Rupert Library | Solz (Text) | 33294001798727 | Adult Fiction - Second Floor | Volume hold | Available | - |
Williams Lake Branch | SOL (Text) | 33923004787515 | General Fiction | Volume hold | Available | - |
- Booklist Reviews : Booklist Reviews 2011 August #1
"Eight newly translated stories show Soviet dissident and Nobel laureate Solzhenitsyn (1918â2008) exploring familiar themesâWWII, Soviet and post-Soviet life, government oppression, related hardships. Formally, the stories reveal an experimental side to the writer. Each consists of two variously related or overlapping parts, a device that allows Solzhenitsyn to highlight contrasts and contradictions and make ample use of irony to hammer home his points as well as indulge in a little fun now and then. In one half of the title story, a kulak who has lost his wealth still has his memories of his mother's sweet preserves; in the other, powerful men in an elegant dacha praise Stalin as they eat apricot jam. In another story, we meet two women named Nastenka, who lead very different lives. To those new to Solzhenitsyn, this selection probably will not replace the classic One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1962), which is a more accessible work, as a first recommendation. Those seeking a more comprehensive understanding of the author, however, will appreciate these stories. High-Demand Backstory: Promotion at the recent BookExpo indicates the publisher fully intends to bring this important author back into the public eye." Copyright 2011 Booklist Reviews. - ForeWord Magazine Reviews : ForeWord Magazine Reviews 2011 - Winter Issue: December 1, 2011
From the Nobel-winning pen of the late Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Russian writer, dramatist, and historian, come eight short stories newly translated into English, which portray social, political, and military conditions during the height and the decline of the Soviet regime. Solzhenitsyn is best known for exposing the Gulag, the Soviet Union's forced labor camp system, and as a result of his controversial work, he was forced to leave Russia from 1974 until 1994. He composed the works in Apricot Jam during the 1990s, after he returned from exile.
Through the stories in Apricot Jam, Solzhenitsyn recognizes the diverse viewpoints and various institutions that played a role in modern-day Russia's fate as a nation; therefore, he creates characters with a passion for war or bureaucracy, as well as professors, prisoners, peasants, and writers. He captures the hope-filled plight of the proletarian class, tracing both their achievements as they ascend the socioeconomic ladder, as well as their stoicism toward oppression.
Solzhenitsyn's military officers, students of science and technology, and young mothers all share a desperate longing for betterment in the future, whether it be from the manifestation of communist or socialist ideology that benefits all, the end of Bolshevik dictatorship, a new generation of godless, avant-garde, class-conscious individuals (described in "A New Generation"), or the ability to "change" one's "social origins." Some characters devote their bodies and minds to affecting change, such as soldiers "taught by the book" who experience "joyous exhaustion" from battle and revel in the "delight of war." Yet there is also a motif of passivity in Solzhenitsyn's stories; characters take note of clouds covering the moon, and this becomes a symbol for their fate as they wait for them to partâand for the light of hope to appear.
Each story is constructed in a "binary" fashion, with two parts (except for one that is divided into twenty-four parts corresponding to the hours in one day). Solzhenitsyn selects this style for purposes of juxtaposition, or to signify the passage of time; some of his characters even have the same name, despite differing circumstances, and he compares them with regard to setting or their social or political standing. The English translation is meticulously crafted, and colloquial expressions are adapted in a way that is comfortable for the American reader.
The first story, "Apricot Jam," depicts an ailing young kulak man who recalls an apricot tree that grew in the yard of his family home. His mother often made jam from its fruit before officials raided the village, detained his family, and chopped down the tree as part of an interrogation threat. His writings are an outcry for someone to take pity on his condition. In part two, a pair of men discuss their own writings with regard to the revolution of language and literature in a corrupt, politicized society. They define a "new type of literature" as "the epic of a classless society" as they sip afternoon tea and enjoy pastries with cherry and apricot jams.
Like the characters in his stories which aspire to compose written records of the political landscape, Solzhenitsyn strives to create an "honest, worthy account of it all," from the onslaught of World War I to the beginning of the Cold War, when the Russian manufacturing industry plummets and threats of privatization abound. The stories complement one another to reveal a country in which a government struggling to gain absolute control simultaneously regulates and disregards its citizens. The stories in Apricot Jam are the stories of both advocates and victims of such a society. And for many, there's only one way outâand that's "the Russian wayâby guess and by God."
© 2011 ForeWord Reviews. All Rights Reserved. - PW Annex Reviews : Publishers Weekly Annex Reviews
In this uneven but fascinating collection of eight stories written after the late Nobel Prize winning author's 1994 return to Russia, seven are structured "binarily," describing Russians from all walks of life both before and after the Soviet upheavals of war, revolution, and reform. This conceit includes enough variation to avoid becoming too schematic, though several of the longer war narratives will mesmerize or fatigue, depending on the reader's willingness to accept form as contentâtheir lumbering progress and myopic point of view closely mirrors a grunt's progress from trench to trench. In "Adlig Schwenkitten: A Tale of Twenty-Four Hours" the commander of a sound-ranging unit charged with locating enemy troops (as Solzhenitsyn himself was) is as frustrated by his inability to find Nazis as he is dismayed by the whereabouts of the Soviet battalions for whom he is scouting. More crisply told is the title story, in which a prisoner sends a desperate letter to a famous writer, pleading for food and recalling an apricot tree from his peasant childhood; upon receiving the letter, the writer envies the prisoner's naive writing style. After surviving imprisonment, censor, and deportation, Solzhenitsyn (The Gulag Archipelago) more than earns his moments of irony, though a sense of resignation permeates these pages. (Sept.)
[Page ]. Copyright 2011 PWxyz LLC