The University of Note Dame Press has announced a major new Solzhenitsyn series, called The Center for Ethics and Culture Solzhenitsyn Series. March 1917: Red Wheel, Node III, Book 1, the first book in this series, will be published later this month. It is the continuation of Solzhenitsyn's epic Red Wheel novel, which begins with August 1914, then October 1916, and now March 1917.
The October 30th edition of the National Review featured an article, "The Russian Revolution, 100 Years On: Its Enduring Allure and Menace" accompanied by sidebars highlighting notable Russian authors. In one, Anne Applebaum, the Pulitzer-Prize-winning author of Gulag: A History, speaks to the influence of Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago on the West.
“When we look back at the 20th century, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn will be remembered not just as an influential author, but as one of the few authors who actually altered the way in which millions of people thought about politics. ”
Letitia Montgomery-Rodgers reviews March 1917, Book 1 at Foreword.
“In March 1917, Solzhenitsyn attempts the impossible and succeeds, evoking a fully formed world through episodic narratives that insist on the prosaic integrity of every life, from tsars to peasants. What emerges is a rich history that’s truly greater than the sum of its parts.”
James Pontuso, writing at the Victims of Communism blog: "Solzhenitsyn’s multi-volume The Red Wheel attempts to answer the question: why did the Russian Revolution occur?”
“It was in this chaotic situation that the peculiar talents of Vladimir Lenin came into play. Solzhenitsyn portrays Lenin throughout The Red Wheel as disciplined, self-assured, cunning, and ruthless.”
A review of March 1917, Book 1 by Gary Saul Morson in The New Criterion.
“In the final analysis, The Red Wheel is less a political novel than an anti-political novel […] To see life solely in political terms is to misunderstand it.”
A new book on Solzhenitsyn is out this month, Solzhenitsyn: The Historical-Spiritual Destinies of Russia and the West. According to Solzhenitsyn scholar Dan Mahoney, “Lee Congdon has succeeded in encapsulating Solzhenitsyn’s intellectual engagement with the twentieth century through an integration of Solzhenitsyn’s corpus into its historical, political, philosophical, and religious context. This is a masterful accomplishment and a major contribution to the field of Solzhenitsyn studies.”
As highlighted in The Guardian this week, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's multivolume epic The Red Wheel will soon be published in English for the first time in its entirety.
“You might say that he caught the last train of departing memory. He was able to interview some of the last living participants of those fateful days in 1917, and of the Russian civil war that followed. His childhood years were the fearsome Soviet 1920s and early 1930s, when the revolution was in fact still ongoing, completely reshaping the old order amidst an atmosphere of terror. Born just a year after the revolution, he breathed its powerful, both terrifying—and for some, edifying—air.”
Located in Rostov-on-Don, the Southern Federal University (SFU) has announced plans to create a virtual museum about the author in hopes of inspiring current students. The author graduated from Rostov University and went on to teach at a school in Morozovka for a short time before he began his service in WWII. There will also be a monument in his honor.
As covered by the Russkiy Mir Foundation, a cultural center named in honor of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn opened recently in Paris. Solzhenitsyn scholar George Nivat is a member of the center's steering committee. The first exhibit, "The Gulag Archipelago, History of Literary Breakthrough", highlights historical photos and artifacts from the novel's development, which Solzhenitsyn wrote while in hiding in Estonia in 1967.
Photo courtesy of the Facebook page of Centre culturel Alexandre Soljenitsyne - Les Editeurs Réunis
A reconsideration of Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago that talks about its continuing relevance to Russia and the West, published yesterday at voegelinview. The piece's writer, Daniel J. Mahoney, is a Solzhenitsyn scholar who also serves as the Vice President of The Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Center.
“Macbeth’s self-justifications were feeble—and his conscience devoured him. Yes, even Iago was a little lamb, too. The imagination and the spiritual strength of Shakespeare’s villains stopped short at a dozen corpses. Because they had no ideology.
Ideology—that is what gives villainy its long-sought justification and gives the villain the necessary steadfastness and determination…
Thanks to ideology, the twentieth century was fated to experience villainy on a scale calculated in the millions.”
A monument dedicated to Solzhenitsyn's will be raised on Ulitsa Solzhenitsyna, the Moscow street named in the author's honor. It was also announced that a potential museum dedicated to Solzhenitsyn is also in development; a location on Tverskaya ulitsa, a major throughfare in Moscow on which the author lived with his wife and young boys, has been considered.
“Aleksandr never received a ‘propiska’ for Moscow...He was effectively banned from living in the capital. In spite of this, before we were exiled, we lived in an apartment on Tverskaya, where our sons were born. This apartment houses some of Aleksandr’s significant mementos. This place deserves to become a museum to honor him.”
Solzhenitsyn translators Peter Constantine and Marian Schwartz are to speak in New York City as part of Russian Literature Week. They will discuss works of Solzhenitsyn not yet published in English.
The Russian A. I. Solzhenitsyn Museum and Informational Cultural Center opened on May 31 in Kislovodsk.
Solzhenitsyn’s birthplace, Kislovodsk, is a spa town on the north slope of the Caucasus Mountains, and near the steppes (prairies) of southern Russia. Solzhenitsyn’s grandparents farmed in this region. Although the home where he was born and the church where he was baptized were both destroyed, the home that once belonged to his aunt, Maria Gorina, and where he lived as a toddler, remains. The State Literature Museum restored the home so that it could serve as the site of the new museum.
The Woodrow Wilson Center’s Kennan Institute has launched the Solzhenitsyn Initiative to translate major works by Solzhenitsyn for the first time into English.
Last week Ignat Solzhenitsyn, son of the author, presented a lecture in Brattleboro, Vermont on "Writing the Red Wheel in Vermont", about the unique approach used by Solzhenitsyn in tackling this enormously complex literary project. The lecture was part of the Vermont Humanities Council First Wednesdays series.
2014.04.02 Ignat Solzhenitsyn "First Wednesdays" lecture at Brooks Memorial Library, Brattleboro, Vermont
In 1956, having been freed from exile in Kazakhstan, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn took a teaching position at a school in the village of Mezinovka. He rented a room from Matryona Vasilyevna, who would go on to be the inspiration for his novella Matryona's Home, which he wrote that year.
A memorial to the writer and a reconstruction of Matryona's home were unveiled last week in Mezinovka.
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The Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Center supports explorations into the life and writings of the Nobel Laureate and Russian writer and historian Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn.
