Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89

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Level -> Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/3/2008 5:18:04 PM)
quote: MOSCOW - Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the Nobel Prize-winning Russian author whose books chronicled the horrors of dictator Josef Stalin's slave labor camps, has died of heart failure, his son said Monday. He was 89. Stepan Solzhenitsyn told The Associated Press his father died late Sunday in Moscow, but declined further comment. Through unflinching accounts of the eight years he spent in the Soviet Gulag, Solzhenitsyn's novels and non-fiction works exposed the secret history of the vast prison system that enslaved millions. The accounts riveted his countrymen and earned him years of bitter exile, but international renown. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080803/ap_on_re_eu/obit_solzhenitsyn He was brave, to stand up to the Soviet system like he did.

TheHeretic -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/3/2008 5:37:01 PM)
I'm sorry to hear this. Reading The Gulag Archipelago marked a major change in my political outlook. If I had a personal top-five list of most influential books, it would be there.

bipolarber -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/3/2008 5:41:30 PM)
The man was brave and brilliant... 89 is a dman good run for anyone... and probably something of a miracle for a man whom that hated government would have loved to have seen dead.

cloudboy -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/3/2008 6:25:45 PM)
I've always believed that Glasnost was more responsible for the fall of Communism in Europe and the USSR than all our military shenanigans and covert ops rolled into one. Solzhenitsyn almost singlehandedly got this ball rolling. I remember Russians reading the Gulag Archipelago on the subways in 1989 while in Eastern Europe and the Baltics the native populations called for revolution. To me the failure of US Foreign policy and its attendant misadventures has been our failure to see how we should just compete with other countries straight up when we hold the advantages of a more progressive government, vibrant culture, and superior economy. This tack, though, doesn't jive with our military industrial complex.

slaveboyforyou -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/3/2008 7:14:49 PM)
quote: I've always believed that Glasnost was more responsible for the fall of Communism in Europe and the USSR than all our military shenanigans and covert ops rolled into one. Solzhenitsyn almost singlehandedly got this ball rolling. I remember Russians reading the Gulag Archipelago on the subways in 1989 while in Eastern Europe and the Baltics the native populations called for revolution. To me the failure of US Foreign policy and its attendant misadventures has been our failure to see how we should just compete with other countries straight up when we hold the advantages of a more progressive government, vibrant culture, and superior economy. This tack, though, doesn't jive with our military industrial complex. You just had to take a stab at the West, didn't you? Of course, Solzhenitsyn didn't quite see it the way you do. He was staunchly for our military efforts against Communism, and he rightly saw Communism as a global threat. He got a cold shoulder from the Lefties when he criticized the anti-Vietnam War movement, and for his warnings about Communist aggression.

cloudboy -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/3/2008 8:54:31 PM)
quote: You just had to take a stab at the West No, that's a stab at US foreign policy.

slaveboyforyou -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/3/2008 9:19:06 PM)
quote: No, that's a stab at US foreign policy. Well, Solzhenitsyn would be in disagreement with you there too in regards to the Cold War. Since we won the Cold War, I wouldn't call our foreign policy a failure.

meatcleaver -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 12:49:00 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou quote: No, that's a stab at US foreign policy. Well, Solzhenitsyn would be in disagreement with you there too in regards to the Cold War. Since we won the Cold War, I wouldn't call our foreign policy a failure. He was wrong on the Vietnam war and Harold Wilson the British Prime Minister was right when he said the Vietnam war was a colonial war, not a war against communism but Solzhenitsyn was right when he said westerners aren't as free as they like to think they are. Solzhenitsyn had something of a hard time in the west because once out of the Soviet Union, his righteous indignation was just that, righteous indignation without substance.

cloudboy -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 6:27:24 AM)
quote: Well, Solzhenitsyn would be in disagreement with you there too in regards to the Cold War. Since we won the Cold War, I wouldn't call our foreign policy a failure. Stalin Industrialized the USSR and won WWII. Since he did those two things, does he get a free pass on everything else? There could have been a lot less cold war fallout had we not been so paranoid and insecure here in the USA --- but overestimating our threats (and acting on those overestimations) has been a staple of US policy since WWII. All that shit we pulled, and the USSR simply reformed itself from within. Didn't you do any kind of double-take when we recovered Sadam Hussein, the menace to the "free world," from a hole in the ground outside some ramshack home? Does any of this stuff ever register with you?

slaveboyforyou -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 6:55:41 AM)
quote: Stalin Industrialized the USSR and won WWII. Since he did those two things, does he get a free pass on everything else? I wouldn't compare Stalin's brutality to the collective efforts of the United States and the Western world. So no, he doesn't. By the way, another thing that Sozhenitsyn pointed out was that Lenin actually started the Gulag trains and the mass executions. Stalin just picked up the pace. Did you ever read anything he wrote? quote: There could have been a lot less cold war fallout had we not been so paranoid and insecure here in the USA --- but overestimating our threats (and acting on those overestimations) has been a staple of US policy since WWII. I wouldn't call our fears about the Soviet Union overestimations. Whether you want to accept it or not, the Soviets were actively trying to exert their influence all over the world. It's pretty easy to see that when you notice what kind of rifles people in poor, war torn countries are carrying. Why do you think the Soviets were giving away Kalashnikovs like they were candy? We weren't being paranoid at all. quote: All that shit we pulled, and the USSR simply reformed itself from within. Are you kidding? The Soviet Union didn't reform itself, it collapsed in on itself. Despite the coup, Gorbachev was a die-hard commie till the very end. The Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact fell apart and not always with a whisper. If you don't recall, the Romanians took their leader and his wife out and shot them. Yugoslavia decended into a decade long civil war. The Soviet Union lost huge chunks of their nation, and they still haven't caught up economically yet. For most of the 90's and this decade, they've been fighting their own costly war with the Chechen seperatists. They didn't reform anything, they were vanquished.

meatcleaver -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 7:07:45 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou I wouldn't call our fears about the Soviet Union overestimations. Whether you want to accept it or not, the Soviets were actively trying to exert their influence all over the world. It's pretty easy to see that when you notice what kind of rifles people in poor, war torn countries are carrying. Why do you think the Soviets were giving away Kalashnikovs like they were candy? We weren't being paranoid at all. Just about every aggressive initial move was made by the USA (the other western powers being impotent in influencing US policy). Don't mention Cuba, Russia wanting to place missiles in Cuba was a response to the USA placing missiles in Turkey. As we get furtyher from the cold war and more documents are released by European countries it is becoming increasingly obvious, most European countries thought the USSR didn't have the capacity to invade western Europe and thought the USSR was merely taking a defensive position. It was the USA that was in an ideological mindset, not NATO. France, Spain weren't worried, Dutch soldiers had weekends off to go home. The British would sell their country to have the US fuck them but even there as more official papers are released from the Cold War, they too didn't believe the USSR would make an aggressive move in Europe. Most Europeans were more fearful of the USA taking aggressive action, not the Russians. Supposedly being US allies didn't make many Europeans feel any better because the war was going to be fought here and considered the US as quite happy to have Europe obliterated for their ideological reasons. You will get rightwing Europeans that will give the opposite view but then, the rightwing wanted American ideological capitalism.

meatcleaver -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 7:13:48 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: slaveboyforyou quote: All that shit we pulled, and the USSR simply reformed itself from within. Are you kidding? The Soviet Union didn't reform itself, it collapsed in on itself. Despite the coup, Gorbachev was a die-hard commie till the very end. The Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact fell apart and not always with a whisper. If you don't recall, the Romanians took their leader and his wife out and shot them. Yugoslavia decended into a decade long civil war. The Soviet Union lost huge chunks of their nation, and they still haven't caught up economically yet. For most of the 90's and this decade, they've been fighting their own costly war with the Chechen seperatists. They didn't reform anything, they were vanquished. Back in 1917 Lenin said the Communist experiment wouldn't work, even though he still went a head with it. The USSR collapsed from the inside out, it was collapsing from the 60s onwards, the arms race speeded it up. Gorbachev did start reforms and Yeltsin took them further. We would have better relations with Russia today had Yeltsin not been stupid enough to take advice off rightwing American economists. That acvice caused the complete collapse of the Russian economy and why Putin is now so suspicious of the west.

Vendaval -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 8:28:31 AM)
May the world remember your words and the lessons from your life. Rest in peace, Mr. Solzhenistyn.

cloudboy -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 8:29:44 AM)
When the poor guy went back to Russia, the process of McDonaldization was already under way..... I read THE CANCER WARD, THE FIRST CICLE, and ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH. The short story, Matryona's House was the only thing I read in Russian --- because his prose was so difficult and slang laden.

cloudboy -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 8:33:35 AM)
Lenin actually tried to remove Stalin from the Communist party before his death, but he didn't have the health and influence to pull it off. One of the GREAT QUESTIONS of the 20th CENTURY is what would have been had either: 1) Lenin lived or; 2) Stalin been removed.

Moloch -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 3:54:48 PM)
I hate his writing style, very boring but detailed and informative, other than that hes a shovenist pig and a self centered attention whore. forgot to add hes also very antisemetic, and his rants make as much sence as hitlers.

cloudboy -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 4:50:16 PM)
It only seems appropriate to put up a passage. What sort of man are we talking about?” he continued. “Suddenly all the professors and all the engineers turn out to be wreckers, and he believes it? The best Civil-War divisional commanders turn out to be German and Japanese spies, and he believes it. The whole of Lenin’s old guard are shown up as vile renegades, and he believes it! His own friends and acquaintances are unmasked as enemies of the people, and he believes it! Millions of Russian soldiers turn out to have betrayed their country, and he believes it all! Whole nations, old men and babies are all mowed down, and he believes it! Then what sort of man is he, may I ask. He’s a fool. But can there really be a whole nation of fools? No, you’ll have to forgive me. the people are intelligent enough, its simply that they wanted to live. There’s a law big nations have—to endure and so to survive. When each of us dies and History stands over his grave and asks, ‘What was he?’ There’ll only be one answer, Pushkin’s” “In our vile times …Man was, whatever his element, Either tyrant or traitor or prisoner!” THE CANCER WARD -------- I thought this section above was representative of his Nobel Speech, which the NYT described thusly, He (Solszhenitsyn) wrote that while an ordinary man was obliged "not to participate in lies," artists had greater responsibilities. "It is within the power of writers and artists to do much more: to defeat the lie!"

FatDomDaddy -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 5:38:44 PM)
quote: ORIGINAL: cloudboy Stalin Industrialized the USSR and won WWII. Won WWII??? How would he have done without Lend Lease?

BrokenSaint -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 6:53:37 PM)
Another decent human being bites the dust :(

cloudboy -> RE: Alexander Solzhenitsyn dies at 89 (8/4/2008 7:48:55 PM)
quote: Won WWII??? How would he have done without Lend Lease? Yes, it was a cooperative effort, but most historians would agree that WWII turned with the Battle of Stalingrad. Roy Medvedev, a Russian Historian, argued that of all the USSR's accomplishments, including the victory in WWII, came despite Stalin.

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