Excellent account about the Stalin Era

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	• Journey into the Whirlwind (Helen and Kurt Wolff Books) Eugenia Semyonovna Ginzburg Harvest/HBJ Book, 2002 - 432 pages average customer review:based on 28 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

A Must-Read

This book reminded me of Holocaust accounts and the novel 1984, but it surpassed both of them in terms of what humanity is capable of. It is simply unthinkable that Ginzburg could be put into jail and tortured by the party that she was devoutly loyal to, and that she could hold out hope and stick to her moral values for so long. The stories of some of the prisoners are heart wrenching- escaping the Gestapo only to be sent to the gulag, or having your son raised essentially his entire life in jail after jail. This memoir illustrates the whole range of human capability from the evil party leaders, the spiteful accusers (life-ruiners), the brainwashed party followers, and the disillusioned survivors.

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Incredible. Just Incredible.

I've read both Journey into the Whirlwind and Within the Whirlwind. I've also read most of Solzhenitsyn's work and this is different and all the more horrible because it is a memoir.

Imagine yourself, an up and coming professional, married to an up and coming professional, two kids, nice apartment, all the benefits of being successful. But there is something in the air, people are disappearing, and the government is denouncing traitors and conspiracies at a fever pitch.

People you know, professionals like yourself, start to disappear. The fear is palpable. To talk about it, it is believed, is to bring the same fate down on your own head. Everybody just carries on. But you can feel it coming. Your friends no longer contact you. Are they afraid of you? Is this your imagination? Do they know something you don't? You reflect back. Who could have denounced you? Did you make an ill considered remark? Were you friends with the wrong person?

When the authorities finally come it is not a surprise.

You enter into the maw of the gulag, slowly pass into its guts and there, utterly alone, isolated, you exist and time drips slowly by....

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Very personal , very good!

This was a very good book, one of the best I had read about people sentenced to prison. Most of the books in this genre have been written by men, it was nice to see Eugenia Ginzburg give a woman's perspective. She tells a very touching tale & every page you feel closer to this brave / intelligent woman. The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn was the most recent book I have read on the same topic. This is also a very good book but I would say I preferred "Journey into the Whirlwind" a little more just because it was one person's personal tale & I think her translator did a very good book translating this book into English.

I did have a few minor questions & if you haven't read this book you may want to stop reading here ....

What I wanted to know as I was reading the book & never did find out by the end of the story was : 1) She mentions her husband countless times through the book but you never find out what happens to him. 2) She has two children that she is separated from while they are young - you never do hear what happens to them & how they get together (if they do). She does mention in the epilogue that she wrote things intending to give them to her grandchildren so I assume she gets reunited with her children & lives to see her grandchildren. 3) She is sentenced to a 10 term & 417 out of 418 pages total are dedicated to her first three years in captivity - the last page is an epilogue that says she ended up serving 18 years in total. It doesn't say why she ended up serving 8 extra years & really 15 of her 18 years in captivity aren't even mentioned in the story.

If you haven't read this book don't let these last few points stop you from reading her story - you would be missing out on a great read.

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"No luck today, my lady Death..."

Eugenia "Genie" Semyonovna Ginzburg spent seventeen years in the Soviet prison system, escaping death, unlike millions of others. She never again saw her husband after being imprisoned. The Gulag Archipelago by Solzhenitsyn, Man is Wolf to Man by Bardach, Kolyma Tales by Shalamov and Journey into the Whirlwind all include overlapping and similar information, but differ in format and style (although hers is most similar to Man is Wolf to Man in its telling). Her memoir of life in the Gulag is one of few written by women and so provides a unique and interesting perspective. All are fantastic books, well-written, often unbelievable and mesmerizing, but there is a noticeable difference between the multi-volume The Gulag Archipelago and Journey into the Whirlwind (seemingly short at just over 400 pages).

Genie is first brought in for questioning in 1934. With her young children in the other room and her husband away on business, she takes the call. Her beliefs at that time are such that she would willingly die for the party. Soon thereafter, she is incarcerated at Black Lake and is eventually sentenced to ten years of solitary confinement for not denouncing a coworker who had written an article offensive to the party.

During her interrogation sessions, in which she repeatedly refuses to "denounce" that is, lie, about the activities of acquaintances facing the same fate, she comes face to face with people who she thought were friends, but who have willingly denounced her in hopes of receiving special treatment, or lighter sentences. She herself never caves. Some of the interesting and different information found in her telling of life in the prison system during Stalin's rule, she is able to provide information about life within prison and receive information about the outside world using (coded) "Aesopian Language." Prisoners also use a system of knocks to communicate messages to one another and keep track of goings on within the prison and the status of their prison mates. Although it's a boring, lonely, (she has one cell mate most of the time), damp, horrible, hungry life, she survives long enough to be sent to Kolyma, where she realizes just how "good" she'd had it in solitary confinement. What she recounts from Kolyma is similar in many instances to the recollections of other Gulag prisoners, except for anecdotes referring specifically to life among the women.

Readers who enjoyed the aforementioned books should include Gulag: A History by Anne Applebaum, which provides a general overview of the prison system, in their list of companion reads.

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Excellent account about the Stalin Era

Think about it. You are completely devoted to a political ideal. You give your heart and soul for the cause of this ideal, only to be accused of Terrorism against the politics you stand for.
This is the life of Genia. This is a true story of a Woman who is stripped of her family. Tortured both mentally and physically, on false accusations that she was involved in terrorism against the Russian Government.
This book is fascinating. Eugenias account of the days she spent being interrogated, and locked up in Solitary confinement are not only horrifying in its own right, but downright uncomfortable knowing that she, and thousands of others were being falsly accused of treason against the Soviet Union Government back in the late 1930's.
The book itself is very well written. Eugenia recalls, in detail, events that happened to her and her "Comrades" during Stalins reign of terror. I could not, personally, put the book down.
If your interests lie in History, this is a very interesting account of an era that was confused, both Politically, and personally.
You are not wasting your money. This is an excellent read. I would recommend it to anyone.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Both witness to and victim of Stalin?s reign of terror, a courageous woman tells the story of her harrowing eighteen-year odyssey through Russia?s prisons and labor camps. Translated by Paul Stevenson and Max Hayward. A Helen and Kurt Wolff Book

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