Imprint
- MacLehose Press
- MacLehose Press
- MacLehose Press
- Maclehose Press
Russia, Second World War fiction, Short stories
-
Imprint
MacLehose Press
- Paperback Sep 12, 2023 | 9781529414752 | RRP $22.99 Buy Now
- Trade Paperback Aug 30, 2022 | 9781529414745 | RRP $32.99 Buy Now
- Hardback Nov 29, 2022 | 9781529414738 | RRP $59.99 Buy Now
- e-Book Aug 18, 2022 | 9781529414769 | RRP $15.99 Buy Now
-
Imprint
MacLehose Press
- Paperback Sep 12, 2023 | 9781529414752 | RRP $22.99 Buy Now
- Trade Paperback Aug 30, 2022 | 9781529414745 | RRP $32.99 Buy Now
- Hardback Nov 29, 2022 | 9781529414738 | RRP $59.99 Buy Now
- e-Book Aug 18, 2022 | 9781529414769 | RRP $15.99 Buy Now
-
Imprint
MacLehose Press
- Paperback Sep 12, 2023 | 9781529414752 | RRP $22.99 Buy Now
- Trade Paperback Aug 30, 2022 | 9781529414745 | RRP $32.99 Buy Now
- Hardback Nov 29, 2022 | 9781529414738 | RRP $59.99 Buy Now
- e-Book Aug 18, 2022 | 9781529414769 | RRP $15.99 Buy Now
-
Imprint
Maclehose Press
- Paperback Sep 12, 2023 | 9781529414752 | RRP $22.99 Buy Now
- Trade Paperback Aug 30, 2022 | 9781529414745 | RRP $32.99 Buy Now
- Hardback Nov 29, 2022 | 9781529414738 | RRP $59.99 Buy Now
- e-Book Aug 18, 2022 | 9781529414769 | RRP $15.99 Buy Now
Vasily Grossman's third great war novel, written before Life and Fate and Stalingrad
One of Grossman's three great war novels - alongside Life and Fate and Stalingrad.
"A significant, valuable addition to Grossman's small but powerful body of work" WILLIAM BOYD
"A remarkable novel that illuminates the terrible realities of Barbarossa and the banal horror of warfare with incomparable understanding and insight" JONATHAN DIMBLEBY
"There are always good reasons for reading Grossman, but few times are as resonant as our own" Financial Times
"At the heart of his writing lies a tireless humanity and empathy" Telegraph
"Grossman combines a journalist's eye with a novelist's empathy" SpectatorSet during the catastrophic defeats of the war's first months, it tracks a Red Army regiment that wins a minor victory in eastern Belorussia but fails to exploit this success. A battalion is then entrusted with the task of slowing the German advance, and eventually encircled, before ultimately breaking out and joining with the rest of the Soviet forces.
Grossman's descriptions of the natural world - and his characters' relationship to it - are both vivid and unexpected, as are his memorable character sketches: eleven-year-old Lionya is determined to hang on to his toy revolver as he walks a long distance behind German lines; his defiant grandmother slaps a German officer in the face and is shot; Kotenko, a fiercely anti-Soviet peasant who initially welcomes the Germans, hangs himself in despair when they treat him with contempt; and Semion Ignatiev, a womanizer and gifted story-teller, turns out to be the boldest and most resourceful of the rank-and file soldiers.
Grossman spent most of the war years close to the front line. But The People Immortal is far from being mere morale-boosting propaganda. On the contrary, as letters included in this volume make clear, it was read as a textbook, and as a work of military education. This edition includes not only the unredacted novel itself, translated here for the first time since 1946, but also a wealth of background material.
A heavily redacted English translation of The People Immortal was published in 1946. This current edition is the first that reflects Grossman's original text.
Translated from the Russian by Robert and Elizabeth Chandler
More books by Vasily Grossman
Praise for The People Immortal
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Grossman's great and enduring asset as a novelist is that - paradoxically - he didn't have to rely on his imagination. He was there . . . It gives his writing unrivalled authority . . . [A] significant, valuable addition to Grossman's small but powerful body of work - Sunday Times
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Grossman's future greatness is written in its pages . . . at the heart of his writing lies a tireless humanity and empathy - Telegraph
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Thanks to a superb translation by Robert and Elizabeth Chandler, based on Julia Volohova's meticulous work on Grossman's original text, we now have the most authoritative edition of The People Immortal yet to appear in English or, indeed, Russian. - Financial Times
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Masterful literary fiction . . . Highly recommended, and beyond doubt the best war-related piece of writing this reviewer has read to date - Irish Examiner
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Its greatest strength lies in its authenticity . . . Grossman combines a journalist's eye with a novelist's empathy - Spectator
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An absorbing book, without the scope and critiques of Grossman's LIFE AND FATE, but with all of its humanity and discernment - Irish Times
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An indispensable companion piece to his other works . . . Grossman was one of the greatest chroniclers of the Second World War in all its inhumanity. - Jewish Chronicle
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There are always good reasons for reading Grossman, but few times are as resonant as our own. As a proud son of Ukraine, steeped in Russian culture, Grossman was both a chronicler of the Soviet Union's greatest victories and a clear-eyed investigator of some of its darkest crimes. - Financial Times
Vasily Grossman
VASILY SEMIONOVICH GROSSMAN (1905-1964) was born into a Jewish family in Berdichev, in what is now Ukraine. In 1934 he published both "In the Town of Berdichev" - a short story that won him immediate acclaim - and the novel GlA ckauf, about Donbas miners. During the Second World War, he worked as a reporter for the army newspaper Red Star; his "The Hell of Treblinka" (1944) was one of the first accounts of a Nazi death camp to be published in any language. His long novel Stalingrad was published in 1952. During the next few years Grossman worked on his second Stalingrad novel: Life and Fate. In February 1961, the KGB confiscated his typescript, but he was able to continue working on Everything Flows, which is yet more critical of the Soviet regime, until his last days. The short stories he wrote during his last three years are among his supreme achievements; English translations are included in The Road. Grossman died on 14 September 1964, on the eve of the twenty-third anniversary of the massacre of the Jews of Berdichev, in which his mother had died.
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