Almost a third of the prison-camp term - from August 1950 to February 1953 - Alexander Isaevich Solzhenitsyn served in the Ekibastuz special camp in the north of Kazakhstan. There, in general works, and on a long winter day the idea of \u200b\u200ba story about one day of one prisoner flashed. “It was just such a camp day, hard work, I was carrying a stretcher with my partner and thought how to describe the whole camp world - in one day,” the author said in a TV interview with Nikita Struve (March 1976). - Of course, you can describe your ten years of the camp, there is the whole history of the camps - but it is enough to collect everything in one day, as if in fragments, it is enough to describe only one day of one average, unremarkable person from morning to evening. And everything will be. "

Alexander Solzhenitsyn

The story "One day of Ivan Denisovich" [see. on our site its full text, summary and literary analysis] was written in Ryazan, where Solzhenitsyn settled in June 1957 and from the new academic year became a teacher of physics and astronomy at secondary school No. 2. Started May 18, 1959, completed 30 June. The work took less than a month and a half. “It always turns out this way if you write from a dense life, the way of life of which you know too much, and not that you don’t have to guess at something, try to understand something, but only fight off unnecessary material, just so that unnecessary fit, but to accommodate the most necessary, "- said the author in a radio interview for the BBC (June 8, 1982), which was conducted by Barry Holland.

While writing in the camp, Solzhenitsyn, in order to keep what he wrote in secret and with him himself, first memorized some verses, and at the end of the term, dialogues in prose and even solid prose. In exile, and then rehabilitated, he could work without destroying passage after passage, but he still had to hide in order to avoid a new arrest. After being typed on a typewriter, the manuscript was burned. The manuscript of the camp story was also burned. And since the typescript had to be hidden, the text was printed on both sides of the sheet, without margins and without spaces between lines.

Only more than two years later, after the sudden violent attack on Stalin by his successor N. S. Khrushchev at the XXII Party Congress (October 17 - 31, 1961), A. S. ventured to offer the story to the press. “Cave typing” (out of caution - without the name of the author) on November 10, 1961 was transferred by R.D. Orlova, wife of AS's prison friend, Lev Kopelev, to Anna Samoilovna Berzer, the prose department of the Novy Mir magazine. The typists rewrote the original, Anna Samoilovna, who came to the editorial office of Lev Kopelev, asked what to name the author, and Kopelev suggested a pseudonym for his place of residence - A. Ryazansky.

On December 8, 1961, as soon as the editor-in-chief of Novy Mir, Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky, appeared in the editorial office after a month's absence, A. S. Berzer asked him to read two difficult-to-pass manuscripts. One did not need a special recommendation, even if she had heard about the author: it was the story of Lydia Chukovskaya "Sofya Petrovna". About the other, Anna Samoilovna said: "The camp through the eyes of a peasant is a very popular thing." It was her that Tvardovsky took with him until morning. On the night of December 8-9, he reads and rereads the story. In the morning he dials up the same Kopelev, asks about the author, finds out his address, and a day later calls him to Moscow by telegram. On December 11, the day of his 43rd birthday, A. S. received this telegram: “I ask you to urgently come to the editorial office of the new world zpt, the costs will be paid \u003d Tvardovsky.” And Kopelev already on December 9 telegraphed to Ryazan: "Alexander Trifonovich is delighted with the article" (this is how the former prisoners agreed to encrypt the unsafe story among themselves). For himself, Tvardovsky wrote in his workbook on December 12: "The strongest impression of the last days is the manuscript of A. Ryazansky (Solonzhitsyn), whom I will meet today." Tvardovsky recorded the real surname of the author from voice.

On December 12, Tvardovsky received Solzhenitsyn, summoning the entire head of the editorial board to meet and talk with him. “Tvardovsky warned me,” notes A.S., “that he does not firmly promise the publication (Lord, I was glad that they didn’t give it to the ChKGB!), And he will not indicate the time limit, but he will not spare the effort.” The editor-in-chief immediately ordered to conclude a contract with the author, as noted by A. S ... "at the highest rate they have accepted (one advance is my two-year salary)." Teaching AS earned then "sixty rubles a month."

Alexander Solzhenitsyn. One day of Ivan Denisovich. Read by the author. Fragment

The original titles of the story are "Щ-854", "One day of one prisoner". The final title was composed by the editorial staff of Novy Mir on the first visit of the author, at the insistence of Tvardovsky, by "throwing assumptions over the table with the participation of Kopelev."

In accordance with all the rules of Soviet hardware games, Tvardovsky began to gradually prepare a multi-move combination in order to ultimately enlist the support of the country's chief apparatchik Khrushchev - the only person who could authorize the publication of the camp story. At Tvardovsky's request, written reviews about "Ivan Denisovich" were written by K. I. Chukovsky (his note was called "Literary Miracle"), S. Ya. Marshak, K. G. Paustovsky, K. M. Simonov ... a short preface to the story and a letter addressed to the First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers NS Khrushchev. On August 6, 1962, after nine months of editorial labor, the manuscript of "One Day in Ivan Denisovich" with a letter from Tvardovsky was sent to Khrushchev's assistant, V.S.Lebedev, who agreed, after waiting for an opportune moment, to acquaint the patron with an unusual composition.

Tvardovsky wrote:

“Dear Nikita Sergeevich!

I would not consider it possible to encroach on your time in a private literary business, if not for this truly exceptional case.

We are talking about the amazingly talented story of A. Solzhenitsyn "One Day in Ivan Denisovich." The name of this author has never been known to anyone, but tomorrow it may become one of the remarkable names of our literature.

This is not only my deep conviction. The voices of other prominent writers and critics, who had the opportunity to familiarize themselves with it in the manuscript, join the unanimous appreciation of this rare literary find by my co-editors for the Novy Mir magazine, including K. Fedin.

But due to the unusual life material covered in the story, I feel an urgent need for your advice and approval.

In a word, dear Nikita Sergeevich, if you find the opportunity to pay attention to this manuscript, I will be happy, as if it were my own work ”.

In parallel with the progress of the story through the supreme labyrinths, the journal went on a routine work with the author on the manuscript. On July 23, a discussion of the story took place at the editorial board. A member of the editorial board, soon the closest employee of Tvardovsky, Vladimir Lakshin, wrote in his diary:

“This is the first time I see Solzhenitsyn. This is a man of about forty, ugly, in a summer suit - canvas trousers and a shirt with an open collar. The appearance is rustic, the eyes are set deep. There is a scar on the forehead. Calm, restrained, but not embarrassed. Speaks well, fluently, intelligibly, with an exceptional sense of dignity. Laughs openly, showing two rows of large teeth.

Tvardovsky invited him - in the most delicate form, unobtrusively - to think about the remarks of Lebedev and Chernoutsan [an employee of the CPSU Central Committee, to whom Tvardovsky gave Solzhenitsyn's manuscript]. For example, to add righteous indignation to the kavtorang, to remove the shade of sympathy for the Banderaites, to give someone from the camp authorities (the warden at least) in more conciliatory, restrained tones, not all the villains were there.

Dementyev [deputy editor-in-chief of Novy Mir] spoke about the same in a sharper, more direct manner. Yaro stood up for Eisenstein, his "Battleship Potemkin". He said that even from an artistic point of view, he was not satisfied with the pages of the conversation with the Baptist. However, it is not the art that confuses him, but the same fears keep him. Dementyev also said (I objected to this) that it is important for the author to think about how the former prisoners who remained staunch communists after the camp would accept his story.

This hurt Solzhenitsyn. He replied that he had not thought about such a special category of readers and did not want to think about it. “There is a book, and there is me. Maybe I think about the reader, but this is a reader in general, and not different categories ... Then, all these people were not in common jobs. They, according to their qualifications or former position, usually got a job in the commandant's office, at a bread slicer, etc. And you can understand the position of Ivan Denisovich only by working in general jobs, that is, knowing this from the inside. If I even were in the same camp, but watched it from the side, I would not write this. I would not write, I would not understand what kind of salvation is work ... "

There was a dispute about the place of the story, where the author directly speaks about the position of the kavtorang, that he - a finely feeling, thinking person - should turn into a dull animal. And here Solzhenitsyn did not concede: “This is the most important thing. Anyone who does not become dull in the camp, does not coarse his feelings - dies. I myself was saved only by that. I am scared now to look at the photograph as I came out of there: then I was older than now, about fifteen years old, and I was stupid, clumsy, thought worked awkwardly. And only because he was saved. If, as an intellectual, I was inwardly rushing about, getting nervous, experiencing everything that happened, I would surely die. "

In the course of the conversation, Tvardovsky inadvertently mentioned a red pencil, which at the last minute could delete this or that from the story. Solzhenitsyn was alarmed and asked to explain what this meant. Can the editors or censors remove something without showing him the text? “The wholeness of this thing is dearer to me than printing it,” he said.

Solzhenitsyn carefully wrote down all comments and suggestions. He said that he divides them into three categories: those with whom he can agree, even thinks that they are beneficial; those that he will think about are difficult for him; and finally, the impossible - those with whom he does not want to see the thing printed.

Tvardovsky offered his amendments timidly, almost shyly, and when Solzhenitsyn took the floor, he looked at him with love and immediately agreed if the author's objections were substantiated. "

A.S. also wrote about the same discussion:

“The main thing that Lebedev demanded was to remove all those places in which the Cavto rank appeared to be a comic figure (by Ivan Denisovich's standards), as it was conceived, and to emphasize the Cavto rank's partisanship (you must have a“ positive hero ”!). This seemed to me the least of the casualties. I removed the comic, leaving as if “heroic”, but “insufficiently disclosed,” as critics later found. The protest of the cavtorang at the divorce was now a bit swollen (the idea was that the protest was ridiculous), but this, perhaps, did not disturb the picture of the camp. Then it was necessary to use the word "ass" less often to the escorts, I reduced it from seven to three; less often - "bastard" and "bastards" about the authorities (I had a lot); and so that at least not the author, but the kavtorang would condemn the Banderaites (I gave this phrase to the kavtorang, but later I threw it out in a separate edition: it was natural for the kavtorang, but they were too thickly reviled without that). Also, to give the prisoners some kind of hope for freedom (but I could not do that). And the funniest thing for me, a hater of Stalin, was that at least once I had to name Stalin as the culprit of the disaster. (And indeed - he was never mentioned by anyone in the story! It was no coincidence, of course, I succeeded: I saw the Soviet regime, not Stalin alone.) I made this concession: I mentioned the "mustache dad" once ... ".

On September 15, Lebedev told Tvardovsky by telephone that “Solzhenitsyn (“ One Day ”) was approved by N [ikita] S [ergeevi] than,” and that in the coming days the chief would invite him for a conversation. However, Khrushchev himself considered it necessary to enlist the support of the party elite. The decision to publish "One Day of Ivan Denisovich" was made on October 12, 1962 at a meeting of the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee under pressure from Khrushchev. It was only on October 20 that he received Tvardovsky to report the favorable result of his troubles. About the story itself, Khrushchev remarked: “Yes, the material is unusual, but, I will say, both the style and the language are unusual - it didn’t suddenly go off. Well, I think the thing is strong, very. And it does not cause, despite such material, a feeling of heavy, although there is a lot of bitterness. "

After reading “One Day in Ivan Denisovich” even before publication, in typescript, Anna Akhmatova, who described in “ Requiem"The grief of the" hundred million people "on this side of the prison locks, with pressure uttered:" This story is about-by-zan to read and memorize - every citizen out of all two hundred million citizens of the Soviet Union. "

The story, for the sake of weighty named by the editors in the subtitle of the story, was published in the magazine "Novy Mir" (1962. No. 11, pp. 8 - 74; signed for printing on November 3; a signal copy was delivered to the editor-in-chief on the evening of November 15; according to the testimony of Vladimir Lakshin, distribution started on November 17; in the evening of November 19, about 2,000 copies were brought to the Kremlin for the participants in the plenum of the Central Committee) with A. Tvardovsky's note "Instead of a preface." Circulation 96,900 copies. (by permission of the Central Committee of the CPSU, 25,000 were printed additionally). Reprinted in "Roman Gazeta" (Moscow: GIHL, 1963. No. 1/277. 47 p. 700,000 copies) and a book (Moscow: Soviet writer, 1963. 144 p. 100,000 copies). On June 11, 1963, Vladimir Lakshin wrote: “Solzhenitsyn gave me the hastily released“ Soviet Writer ”,“ One Day… ”. The publication is really shameful: a gloomy, colorless cover, gray paper. Aleksandr Isaevich jokes: "They were released in the edition of the GULAG."

Cover of the publication "One Day of Ivan Denisovich" in Roman-Gazeta, 1963

"In order to print her [story] in the Soviet Union, it was necessary to have a combination of incredible circumstances and exceptional personalities," A. Solzhenitsyn noted in a radio interview for the 20th anniversary of the release of "One Day of Ivan Denisovich" for the BBC (June 8, 1982 g.). - It is absolutely clear: if it were not for Tvardovsky as the editor-in-chief of the magazine, no, this story would not have been published. But I will add. And if it had not been for Khrushchev at that moment, it would not have been published either. More: if Khrushchev had not attacked Stalin one more time at this very moment, it would not have been published either. The publication of my story in the Soviet Union, in the 62nd year, is like a phenomenon against physical laws, as if, for example, objects began to rise upward from the ground, or cold stones themselves began to heat up, heat up to fire. It is impossible, it is absolutely impossible. The system was designed this way, and for 45 years it has not released anything - and suddenly there is such a breakthrough. Yes, and Tvardovsky, and Khrushchev, and the moment - all had to come together. Of course, I could later send it abroad and publish it, but now, according to the reaction of the Western socialists, it is clear: if it were published in the West, these very socialists would say: everything is a lie, nothing of this happened, and there were no camps, and there was no destruction, nothing. It was only because everyone was deprived of their languages \u200b\u200bbecause it was published with the permission of the Central Committee in Moscow, and this shocked ”.

“If this had not happened [submission of the manuscript to Novy Mir and publication at home], something else would have happened, and worse,” A. Solzhenitsyn wrote down fifteen years earlier, “I would have sent a photographic film with camp items - abroad, under the pseudonym Stepan Khlynov , as it was already prepared. I didn’t know that in the most successful version, if it were published and noticed in the West, even a hundredth part of that influence could not have happened.

The author's return to work on the Gulag Archipelago is connected with the publication of One Day in Ivan Denisovich. “Even before Ivan Denisovich, I had conceived the Archipelago,” Solzhenitsyn said in a television interview with CBS (June 17, 1974), hosted by Walter Cronkite. “I felt that such a systematic thing was needed, a general plan of everything that was , and in time how it happened. But my personal experience and the experience of my comrades, no matter how much I asked about the camps, all the fate, all the episodes, all the stories, was not enough for such a thing. And when “Ivan Denisovich” was published, letters to me exploded from all over Russia, and in the letters people wrote what they experienced, what they had. Or they insisted to meet with me and tell me, and I started dating. Everyone asked me, the author of the first camp story, to write more, more, to describe this whole camp world. They did not know my plan and did not know how much I had already written, but they carried and brought me the missing material. " “And so I collected indescribable material, which in the Soviet Union and cannot be collected, - only thanks to“ Ivan Denisovich ”, - summed up A. S. in a radio interview for the BBC on June 8, 1982 - So he became like a pedestal for the "GULAG Archipelago" ".

In December 1963, One Day in Ivan Denisovich was nominated for the Lenin Prize by the editorial board of Novy Mir and the Central State Archives of Literature and Art. According to the report of Pravda (February 19, 1964), selected "for further discussion." Then included in the list for the secret ballot. I did not receive the award. Oles Gonchar for the novel "Tronka" and Vasily Peskov for the book "Steps on the dew" ("Pravda", April 22, 1964) became laureates in the field of literature, journalism and publicism. “Even then, in April 1964, it was rumored in Moscow that this story with the voting was a“ rehearsal for a putsch ”against Nikita: will the apparatus succeed or fail to withdraw the book approved by itself? For 40 years, they have never dared to do this. But now they got bold and succeeded. This encouraged them that He Himself is not strong either. "

From the second half of the 60s, "One Day of Ivan Denisovich" was withdrawn from circulation in the USSR, along with other publications of A.S. The final ban on them was introduced by the order of the Main Directorate for the Protection of State Secrets in the Press, agreed with the Central Committee of the CPSU, dated January 28, 1974 The Glavlit Order No. 10 of February 14, 1974, specially dedicated to Solzhenitsyn, lists the issues of the Novy Mir magazine with the writer's works to be removed from public libraries (No. 11, 1962; No. 1, 7, 1963; No. 1, 1966) and separate editions of One Day in Ivan Denisovich, including a translation into Estonian and a book “For the Blind”. The order is provided with a note: "Foreign publications (including newspapers and magazines) with the works of the specified author are also subject to seizure." The ban was lifted by a note from the Ideological Department of the CPSU Central Committee dated December 31, 1988.

Since 1990 “One Day of Ivan Denisovich” has been published again at home.

Foreign feature film based on "One Day in Ivan Denisovich"

In 1971, an Anglo-Norwegian film was shot based on One Day in Ivan Denisovich (directed by Casper Wrede, Tom Courtney as Shukhov). For the first time A. Solzhenitsyn was able to watch it only in 1974. Speaking on French television (March 9, 1976), to the host's question about this film, he replied:

“I must say that the directors and actors of this film approached the task very honestly, and with great penetration, they themselves did not experience it, did not survive, but were able to guess this nagging mood and were able to convey this slow pace that fills the life of such a prisoner 10 years, sometimes 25, if, as often happens, he does not die sooner. Well, very small reproaches can be made to the design, this is mostly where the Western imagination simply can no longer imagine the details of such a life. For example, for our eye, for mine, or if my friends could see it, ex-convicts (will they ever see this film?) - for our eye the quilted jackets are too clean, not torn; then, almost all the actors, in general, are dense men, and after all, there in the camp people are on the very brink of death, they have sunken cheeks, they have no strength. According to the film, it is so warm in the barracks that a Latvian with bare legs and hands is sitting there - this is impossible, you will freeze. Well, these are minor remarks, but in general, I must say, I am surprised how the filmmakers could understand this way and sincerely tried to convey our suffering to the Western audience. "

The day described in the story falls on January 1951.

Based on materials from the works of Vladimir Radzishevsky.

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1959) is the first work of A. Solzhenitsyn to be published. It was this story, published in more than one hundred thousand copies in the 11th issue of the Novy Mir magazine in 1962, that brought the author not only all-Union, but in fact world fame. In the magazine version "One Day ..." had the genre designation "story". In the book "Butting a Calf with an Oak" (1967-1975) Solzhenitsyn told that the author was offered to call this work a story ("for weight") in the editorial office of Novy Mir. Later, the writer expressed regret that he had succumbed to external pressure: “I shouldn't have given in. In our country, the boundaries between genres are closing and forms are being devalued. "Ivan Denisovich" is of course a story, albeit a large one, loaded. "

The significance of A. Solzhenitsyn's work is not only that it opened the previously forbidden theme of repression, set a new level of artistic truth, but also that in many respects (in terms of genre originality, narrative and space-time organization, vocabulary, poetic syntax, rhythm, richness of text with symbolism, etc.) was deeply innovative. "

"THE STRONGEST IMPRESSION OF LAST DAYS - THE MANUSCRIPT OF A. RYAZANSKY"

The story of the publication of the story was complex. After Khrushchev's speech at the XXII Congress of the CPSU, a typewritten copy of the story on November 10, 1961 was transferred by Solzhenitsyn through Raisa Orlova, the wife of a friend on the cell in Lev Kopelev's "sharashka", to the prose department of Novy Mir, Anna Samoilovna Berzer. The author was not listed on the manuscript; at Kopelev's suggestion, Berzer wrote on the cover - “A. Ryazansky "(at the place of residence of the author). On December 8, Berser invited the editor-in-chief of Novy Mir, Alexander Tvardovsky, to familiarize himself with the manuscript. Knowing the tastes of her editor, she said: "Camp through the eyes of a peasant is a very popular thing." On the night of December 8-9, Tvardovsky read and re-read the story. On December 12, in his workbook, he wrote: "The strongest impression of the last days is the manuscript of A. Ryazansky (Solzhenitsyn) ..."

On December 9, Kopelev sent a telegram to Solzhenitsyn: "Alexander Trifonovich is delighted ...". On December 11, Tvardovsky sent a telegram to Solzhenitsyn to come urgently to the editorial office of Novy Mir. On December 12, Solzhenitsyn arrived in Moscow, met with Tvardovsky and his deputies Kondratovich, Zaks, Dementyev at the editorial office of Novy Mir. Kopelev was also present at the meeting. They decided to call the story the story “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich”.

But Tvardovsky's desire to publish this thing was not enough. As an experienced Soviet editor, he understood perfectly well that it would not be published without the permission of the supreme power. In December 1961, Tvardovsky gave the manuscript of "Ivan Denisovich" for reading to Chukovsky, Marshak, Fedin, Paustovsky, Ehrenburg. At Tvardovsky's request, they wrote their written reviews of the story. Chukovsky called his review "Literary Miracle". On August 6, 1962, Tvardovsky handed over the letter and the manuscript of "Ivan Denisovich" to Khrushchev's assistant Vladimir Lebedev. In September, Lebedev began to read the story to Khrushchev during his leisure hours. Khrushchev liked the story, and he ordered to provide the Central Committee of the CPSU with 23 copies of "Ivan Denisovich" for the leading figures of the CPSU. On September 15, Lebedev told Tvardovsky that the story was approved by Khrushchev. On October 12, 1962, under pressure from Khrushchev, the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU decided to publish the story, and on October 20, Khrushchev announced this decision of the Presidium to Tvardovsky. Later, in his memoir book "Butting a Calf with an Oak", Solzhenitsyn admitted that without the participation of Tvardovsky and Khrushchev, the book "One Day in Ivan Denisovich" would not have been published in the USSR. And the fact that she did come out was another “literary miracle”.

"Shch-854. ONE DAY OF ONE CONSUMER "

In 1950, on some long winter camp day, I was carrying a stretcher with my partner and thought: how to describe our whole camp life? In fact, it is enough to describe just one day in detail, in the smallest details, moreover, the day of the simplest workman, and then our whole life will be reflected. And you don’t even need to whip up some horrors, you don’t need it to be some special day, but an ordinary day, this is the day that makes up the years. I conceived this, and this idea remained in my mind, for nine years I did not touch it, and only in 1959, nine years later, I sat down and wrote. I did not write it for long at all, only forty days, less than a month and a half. It always turns out this way if you write from a dense life, the life of which you know too much, and not that you don’t have to guess at something, try to understand something, but only fight off unnecessary material, just so that the excess does not climb , but to accommodate the most necessary. Yes, the title Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky suggested this, the current title, his own. I had "Shch-854. One day of one prisoner. "

From a radio interview with Alexander SolzhenitsynBBCto the 20th anniversary of the release of "One day of Ivan Denisovich"

AKHMATOVA ABOUT IVAN DENISOVICH AND SOLZHENITSYN

“He is not afraid of fame. Probably doesn’t know how terrible it is and what it entails ”.

"DEAR IVAN DENISOVICH ...!" (LETTERS FROM READERS)

“Dear Comrade Solzhenitsyn!<…> I have read your story "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" and thank you from the bottom of my heart for Mother Truth.<…> I work in a mine. I drive an electric locomotive with coking coal trolleys. Our coal has a thousand-degree heat. Let this warmth, through my respect, warm you. "

“Dear comrade A. Solzhenitsyn (unfortunately, I don’t know the name and patronymic). Please accept from faraway Chukotka warm congratulations on your first generally recognized literary success - the publication of the story “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich”. I read it with extraordinary interest. I am delighted with the originality of the language, the deep, embossed, truthful depiction of all the details of camp life. Your story cleans our souls and consciences for all the iniquities and arbitrariness that were perpetrated during the years of the personality cult.<…> Who am I? Was at the front from the battery commander to the PNSh<помощника начальника штаба.> artillery regiment. Due to his injury in the fall of 1943, he did not return to the front. After the war - at party and Soviet work ... ".

“Dear Alexander Isaevich! I have just read your Story (I am writing with a capital letter). I beg your pardon for the incoherence of the letter, I am not a writer and, probably, not even a very literate person, and your Story so excited me and awakened so many sorrowful memories that I have no time for choosing the style and syllable of the letter. You described one day of one prisoner, Ivan Denisovich, it is clear that this is the day of thousands and hundreds of thousands of such prisoners, and this day is not so bad. Ivan Denisovich, summing up the results of the day, is at least satisfied. But such frosty days, when, for divorce, on watch, the day-watchmen take the dead from the barracks and put them in a pile (but there were also those that did not bring the dead at once, but received rations for them for several days), and we, unfortunate prisoners, 58 I, enveloped in all sorts of imaginable and inconceivable rags, stood in formation for five, waited for the withdrawal from the zone, and the accordionist, providing the EHF events<культурно-воспитательной части.>, plays "Katyusha". The shouts of the contractors "I will put my clothes on in cans, and you will go to work", etc., etc., etc. Then 7-8 km into the forest, the harvesting rate is 5 cbm ... ".

“Despite all the horror of this ordinary day<…> it does not even have one percent of those terrible, inhuman crimes that I saw after spending more than 10 years in the camps. I was a witness when 3,000 "orgsils" (as the prisoners were called) entered the mine in the fall, and by the spring, i.e. after 3-4 months, 200 people remained alive. Shukhov slept on a lining, on a mattress, although filled with sawdust, while we slept on bogs in the rain. And when they pulled up the tents with holes, they made bunks out of uncouth poles for themselves, lined pine branches and so, damp, in everything they went to work, went to bed. In the morning, a neighbor on the left or on the right refused the "Stalin ration" forever ... ".

“Dear… (I almost wrote: Ivan Denisovich; unfortunately, I do not know your name and patronymic) dear writer Solzhenitsyn! I am writing to you because I cannot resist writing. Today I read your story in a magazine and am shocked. Moreover, I am happy. I am happy that such an amazing thing has been written and printed. She is irresistible. She with tremendous power confirms the great truth about the incompatibility of art and lies. After the appearance of such a story, in my opinion, any writer will be ashamed to pour pink water. And not a single scoundrel can whitewash the irreplaceable. I am convinced that millions of readers will read One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich with the deepest gratitude to the author. "

At five o'clock in the morning, as always, the ascent struck - with a hammer on the rail by
headquarters barracks. Intermittent ringing faintly passed through the glass, frozen in
two fingers, and soon fell silent: it was cold, and the warden was reluctant for a long time
wave your hand.
The ringing died down, but outside the window everything was the same as in the middle of the night when Shukhov got up
to the parasha, there was darkness and darkness, but three yellow lanterns hit the window: two - on
zone, one - inside the camp.
And they didn't go to unlock the barracks, and it was impossible to hear that the orderlies
they took a parashny barrel on sticks - to carry it out.
Shukhov never slept through the lift, always got up on it - until the divorce
it was an hour and a half of its own time, not official, and who knows the camp life,
can always earn extra money: sew someone from the old lining a cover on
mittens; a rich brigadier to serve dry felt boots directly on the bed, so that he
do not stomp around the heap barefoot, do not choose; or run through the lockers,
where someone needs to be served, sweep or offer something; or go to
the dining room collecting bowls from the tables and taking them down in the dishwasher with slides - too
will be fed, but there are many hunters there, there is no lights out, and most importantly - if there is something in the bowl
left, you can't resist, start licking the bowls. And Shukhov was strongly remembered
the words of his first brigadier Kuzmin - he was an old camp wolf, he was sitting by
nine hundred and forty-third year already twelve years old and its replenishment,
brought from the front, once on a bare clearing by the fire he said:
- Here, guys, the law is the taiga. But people live here too. In the camp here
who dies: who licks the bowls, who hopes for the medical unit, and who goes to the godfather1
knock.
As for the godfather - this, of course, he turned down. Those are saving themselves. Only
their care is on someone else's blood.
Shukhov always got up on his way up, but today he didn’t get up. Since the evening he
I felt uncomfortable, either shivering or breaking. And I didn't get warm at night. Through a dream
it seemed that he seemed to be completely ill, then he left a little. I didn't want everything
to the morning.
But the morning came as usual.
And where do you get eels - there is a lot of ice on the window, and on the walls along
the joint with the ceiling all over the barracks - a healthy barrack! - the spider web is white. Frost.
Shukhov did not get up. He lay on top of the lining, with his head covered
blanket and pea jacket, and in a quilted jacket, in one rolled up sleeve,
feet together. He did not see, but from the sounds he understood everything that was going on in the barracks.
and in their brigade corner. Here, stepping heavily along the corridor, the orderlies carried
one of the eight-bucket parasha. It is considered disabled, easy work, well, come on,
Go and take it out, don't spill it! Here in the 75th brigade, a bunch of boots from

Dryers. And here - in ours (and today it was our turn to dry boots).
The foreman and the foreman are silently putting on their shoes, and their lining creaks. Brigadier
now he will go to the bread slicer, and the foreman will go to the headquarters barracks, to the workmen.
And not just to the workmen, as he goes every day, - Shukhov recalled:
today the fate is being decided - they want their 104th brigade to be fouled from construction
workshops for the new object "Sotsbytgorodok".

This edition is true and final.

No lifetime publications cancel it.

At five o'clock in the morning, as always, the ascent struck - with a hammer on the rail at the headquarters barrack. The intermittent ringing weakly passed through the glass, frozen in two fingers, and soon subsided: it was cold, and the warden was reluctant to wave his hand for a long time.

The ringing died down, and outside the window everything was the same as in the middle of the night, when Shukhov got up to the parasha, there was darkness and darkness, and three yellow lanterns hit the window: two - in the zone, one - inside the camp.

And they didn't go to unlock the barracks, and it was impossible to hear that the orderlies took the parachute barrel on sticks - to carry it out.

Shukhov never slept through the ascent, always got up on it - before the divorce it was an hour and a half of his own time, not official, and who knows the camp life, can always earn extra money: sew someone from the old lining a cover for mittens; for a rich brigadier to serve dry felt boots directly on the bed, so that he does not stomp around the heap with bare feet, does not choose; or run through the lockers, where someone needs to serve, sweep or bring something; or go to the dining room to collect the bowls from the tables and take them to the dishwasher with slides - they will also feed, but there are many hunters, there is no end to it, and most importantly, if you can't resist in the bowl, you start licking the bowls. And Shukhov firmly remembered the words of his first brigadier Kuzemin - he was an old camp wolf, had been in prison for twelve years by the time he was nineteen forty-three, and once said to his reinforcements brought from the front on a bare clearing by the fire:

- Here, guys, the law is the taiga. But people live here too. In the camp, this is who is dying: who licks the bowls, who hopes for the medical unit, and who goes to the godfather to knock.

As for the godfather - this, of course, he turned down. Those are saving themselves. Only their care is on someone else's blood.

Shukhov always got up on his way up, but today he didn’t get up. Even in the evening he felt uneasy, either shivering or breaking. And I didn't get warm at night. Through a dream, it seemed that he seemed to be completely ill, then he left a little. Everyone did not want the morning.

But the morning came as usual.

And where do you get eels - there is a lot of ice on the window, and on the walls along the junction with the ceiling all over the barracks - a healthy barrack! - the spider web is white. Frost.

Shukhov did not get up. He was lying on top of the lining, with his head covered with a blanket and a pea jacket, and in a quilted jacket, in one rolled up sleeve, thrusting both feet together. He did not see, but from the sounds he understood everything that was going on in the barracks and in their brigade corner. Here, stepping heavily along the corridor, the orderlies carried one of the eight-bucket parasha. It is considered disabled, easy work, but come on, take it out, do not spill it! Here in the 75th brigade a bunch of felt boots from the dryer were slammed on the floor. And here - in ours (and today it was our turn to dry boots). The foreman and the foreman are silently putting on their shoes, and their lining creaks. The brigadier will now go to the bread slicer, and the brigadier will go to the headquarters barracks, to the workmen.

Yes, not just to the contractors, as he goes every day, - Shukhov remembered: today the fate is being decided - they want their 104th brigade to be fouled from the construction of workshops to the new Sotsbytgorodok facility. And that social town is a bare field, in snowy hillsides, and before you can do anything there, you have to dig holes, put up poles and pull barbed wire from yourself so as not to run away. And then build.

There, surely, there will be nowhere to warm up for a month - not a kennel. And you can't make a fire - how to heat it? Work hard on your conscience - one salvation.

The foreman is anxious, he is going to settle it. Some other brigade, sluggish, to push themselves there instead. Of course, you can't come to an agreement empty-handed. To carry half a kilo of bacon to the senior contractor. And even a kilogram.

The test is not a loss, shouldn't you try to cut it in the medical unit, free yourself from work for a day? Well, right, the whole body separates.

And yet - which of the guards is on duty today?

On duty - I remembered: Ivan and a half, thin and long sergeant black-eyed. The first time you look - it's just scary, but they recognize him - of all the duty attendants, he is more agreeable: he does not put him in a punishment cell, nor does he drag him to the head of the regime. So you can lie down, as long as in the dining room of the ninth barrack.

The lining shook and swayed. Two people got up at once: above - Shukhov's neighbor, the Baptist Alyoshka, and below - Buinovsky, a former captain of the second rank, Cavtorang.

The old men of the orderlies, carrying out both buckets, got in trouble, who should go for boiling water. They swore affectionately, like women. An electric welder from the 20th brigade barked:

- Hey, wicks! - and launched a felt boot into them. - I'll make peace!

The felt boot knocked dully on the post. They fell silent.

In the next brigade, the brigade leader was a little booted:

- Vasil Fedoritch! They twitched in the food table, you bastards: there were nine hundred and four, but there were only three. Who shouldn't be?

He said this quietly, but, of course, all that team heard and hid: they will cut off a piece of someone in the evening.

And Shukhov lay and lay on the compressed sawdust of his mattress. At least one side would have taken it - or it would have chilled in a chill, or the aches would have passed. And then neither one nor the other.

While the Baptist was whispering prayers, Buinovsky returned from the breeze and announced to anyone, but as if gloatingly:

- Well, hold on, Red Navy men! Thirty degrees of the faithful!

And Shukhov decided to go to the medical unit.

And then someone with authority pulled off his quilted jacket and blanket. Shukhov threw his jacket off his face and raised himself. Below him, his head equal to the top bunk of the lining, stood a thin Tatar.

So he was on duty out of line and crept quietly.

- More - eight hundred and fifty-four! - read the Tartar from a white patch on the back of a black pea jacket. - Three days kondeya with a withdrawal!

And as soon as his special muffled voice rang out, as in the entire half-dark barrack, where not every light was on, where two hundred people slept on fifty bungalows, everyone who had not yet got up began to fidget and hurry to dress.

Spiral of Treason Solzhenitsyn Rzhezach Tomas

The story "One Day in Ivan Denisovich"

A great day has indeed come in the life of Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

In 1962, one of the leading Soviet literary magazines, Novy Mir, published his story One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. It is known to be played out in a forced labor camp.

Much of what for many years has been a painful pain in the heart of every honest person - the question of Soviet forced labor camps - that was the object of speculation, hostile propaganda and slander in the bourgeois press, suddenly took the form of a literary work containing an inimitable and unique imprint of personal impressions ...

It was a bomb. However, it did not explode immediately. Solzhenitsyn, according to N. Reshetovskaya, wrote this story at a rapid pace. Its first reader was L.K., who came to Solzhenitsyn in Ryazan on November 2, 1959.

“This is a typical production story,” he said. "And overloaded with details, too." This is how LK, an educated philologist, “a storehouse of literary erudition,” as he is called, expressed his competent opinion about this story.

This review is perhaps even stricter than Boris Lavrenev's old assessment of Solzhenitsyn's early works. An ordinary production story. This means: the book, which in the Soviet Union came out in hundreds of those years, is an extreme schematism, nothing new either in form or in content. Nothing fancy! And yet it was LK who achieved the publication of One Day in Ivan Denisovich. Alexander Trifonovich Tvardovsky liked the story, and although he considered the author "a talented artist, but an inexperienced writer", he still gave him the opportunity to appear on the pages of the magazine. Tvardovsky belonged to those representatives of his generation, whose path was not so easy and smooth. This remarkable man and renowned poet, by nature, often suffered from complicating some of life's most common problems. A communist poet who won the hearts of not only his people, but also millions of foreign friends with his immortal poems. The life of A. Tvardovsky, in his own words, was a permanent discussion: if he doubted anything, simply and frankly expressed his views on objective reality, as if checking himself. To the point of fanaticism, he was faithful to the motto: "Everything that is talented is useful to Soviet society."

Tvardovsky supported the young author Solzhenitsyn, convinced that his work would benefit the cause of socialism. He believed into it, completely unaware of the fact that this experienced scribe has already hidden in different cities several ready-made libels on the Soviet socialist system. And Tvardovsky defended him. His story was published - the bomb exploded. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich was very quickly published in the Soviet Union in three massive editions. And he was a success with the reader. Letters from former comrades of Solzhenitsyn on imprisonment came to Ryazan. Many of them recognized the protagonist of this work as their former foreman from the Ekibastuz camp. Even from distant Leningrad, L. Samutin came to personally meet with the author and congratulate him.

“I saw in him a kindred spirit, a person who knows and understands the life that we have lived,” L. Samutin told me.

The story was immediately translated into almost all European languages. It is curious that this story was translated into Czech by a well-known representative of the counter-revolutionary movement of 1968-1969, and one of the organizers of the counter-revolution in Czechoslovakia, the son of a White émigré, a writer, especially enthusiastically welcomed its publication.

Solzhenitsyn immediately found himself where he dreamed of climbing since Rostov times - on the top... Again firstas in the school. Malevich. His name was tilted in every way. It first appeared on the pages of the Western press. And the Solzhenitsyn immediately brought up a special folder with clippings of articles from the foreign press, which Alexander Isaevich, although he did not understand due to his ignorance of foreign languages, nevertheless often sorted out and carefully kept.

Those were the days when he reveled in success.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn was invited to the Kremlin and had a conversation with the person thanks to whom the story "One Day in the Day of Ivan Denisovich" was published - with NS Khrushchev. Not hiding his favor for Solzhenitsyn, he presented him with a car, which he nicknamed "Denis" in honor of his story. Then everything was done so that the writer, whom he believed, could move to a more comfortable apartment. The state not only provided him with a four-room apartment, but also allocated a comfortable garage.

The path was open.

But was it a real success? And what caused it?

LK, inclined to scientific analysis, makes such a discovery: “It is simply charming to find that out of 10 readers of Novy Mir who asked about the fate of Cavtorang Buinovsky, there were only 1.3 who were interested in whether Ivan Denisovich lived to be liberated. Readers were more interested in the camp as such, the living conditions, the nature of work, the attitude of the "prisoners" to work, order, etc. "

On the pages of some foreign newspapers, one could read the remarks of more freely and critically-minded literary critics that attention is not yet a literary success, but a political game.

And what about Solzhenitsyn?

Reshetovskaya describes in her book that he was very upset by the review of Konstantin Simonov in Izvestia; disappointed to such an extent that Tvardovsky simply forcibly forced him to finish reading the article of the famous writer.

Solzhenitsyn was angry that Konstantin Simonov did not pay attention to his language. Solzhenitsyn should not be considered a literary dropout. In no case. He read a lot and understands literature. Therefore, he had to conclude: the readers were interested not in the main character, but in the environment. A fellow writer with a keen instinct did not pay attention to Solzhenitsyn's literary abilities. And the press focused more on the political aspect than on the literary merits of the story. It can be assumed that this conclusion made Solzhenitsyn spend more than one hour in sorrowful meditation. In short: for him, who already imagined himself to be an outstanding writer, it meant a disaster. And at an accelerated pace he was in a hurry to "go out." After completing "Matrenin Dvor" and "The Case at the Krechetovka Station", he said to his wife: "Now let them judge. The first one was, say, the topic. And this is pure literature. "

At that moment, he could become "a fighter for cleansing socialism from Stalin's excesses," as they said then. He could also become a fighter against "barbaric communism". Everything depended on the circumstances. At the beginning, everything indicated that he was inclined to choose the former.

After the indisputable success that his story "One Day in Ivan Denisovich" had among the readers, there was even talk that Solzhenitsyn would receive the Lenin Prize. A wide discussion has developed around this issue in Pravda. Some were in favor, others were against, as is always the case. However, then the matter took a slightly different turn.

For Solzhenitsyn, this meant not only disappointment, but - above all - a new choice of life path.

Everything spoke for the fact that he could go without risk in the direction indicated by the “arrow”.

As the daughter of the famous Soviet poet Solzhenitsyn said, authoritarianism does not get along well with morality. She wrote with indignation: “Affirming the primacy of morality over politics, you, in the name of your personal political plans, consider it possible to transcend all limits of what is permitted. You allow yourself to unceremoniously use what you have overheard and spied on through the keyhole, cite gossip received not at first hand, do not even stop before “citing” AT's nighttime delirium, recorded, as you assure us, verbatim ”. [The fact is that in one of his "creations" Solzhenitsyn allowed himself to portray Alexander Tvardovsky in a very unattractive light, slandering, mixing him with dirt and humiliating his human dignity. - T. R.]

“Calling people to“ live not by lies ”, you are with utmost cynicism ... you tell how you made deception a rule in communicating not only with those who were considered enemies, but also with those who extended a helping hand to you, supporting you in a difficult time for you, trusting you ... you are not at all inclined to open up with the fullness that is advertised in your book. "