Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1918–

Name ______Class ______Date ______A Conservative Era Biography Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn 1918–

WHY HE MADE HISTORY A Russian novelist and historian, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn spent eight years in Soviet prisons and labor camps. His books were banned, yet he continued to write in secret. His work was smuggled out of the USSR and read by millions around the world. In 1970 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. He did not receive the prize until four years later, when he was exiled from the USSR for treason. He had done nothing against his homeland but write the truth. York New Collection, Granger The

As you read the biography below, think about freedom of speech. Can a creative individual exist under a government that denies this freedom to its citizens? What happens to a society that persecutes and punishes those who try to express their own ideas?

Raised by his widowed mother on a typist’s salary, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn grew up in a very poor family. Although he was a good student, his mother could not afford to send him to Moscow to study what he wanted to learn about most of all: literature. Instead, Solzhenitsyn studied at Rostov University, which was less expensive, and specialized in mathematics and physics, fields which held better job prospects. Still, he eagerly began to write and studied literature through correspondence classes from Moscow. He graduated in 1941 and did what all Soviet youth were required to do: join the army. 1941 was also the year that Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union. Solzhenitsyn fought in World War II , becoming a captain in the Soviet army. In 1945, however, he wrote a letter to a friend in which he criticized the USSR’s leader, Joseph Stalin. Stalin tried to silence all his critics, even letter writers. Solzhenitsyn was sent to prison for his comments. Solzhenitsyn’s degree in math mostly spared him from hard physical labor. He spent part of his imprisonment at Marfino, a prison where mathematicians and scientists performed research. Solzhenitsyn used the prison library to study a wide range of literature. He also secretly began writing his own poetry and plays. In 1953 Stalin died and Solzhenitsyn was released from prison. Slowly

Copyright © by Holt, Rinehart and Winston. All rights reserved. 9 A Conservative Era Name ______Class ______Date ______A Conservative Era Biography the USSR became a little more open. In 1962 the Soviets allowed Sohzhenitsyn’s first novel to be published. In One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Solzhenitsyn wrote about his time in prison. His story inspired many other writers to share their experiences in Stalin’s prison camps. In 1963 Solzhenitsyn published several fictional stories attacking Soviet policies. As a result, he was denied official publication of any of his future works. From then on his books became “samizdat,” illegal literature that was passed around secretly or smuggled abroad to be published. Eventually millions of people around the world eagerly awaited his new books. His books The First Circle and Cancer Ward dealt with the problems of free- thinking people living in a world of corrupt and dangerous authorities. In 1970 Solzhenitsyn was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. He did not to go to Sweden to receive the prize because he was afraid he would not be allowed to return home. Despite harassment by the Soviet government, Solzhenitsyn continued to write. In 1974 his best-known work, The Gulag Archipelago, was published in Paris. Because of this historical/literary record of the Soviet labor camp system, the Soviet Union finally charged him with treason and sent him into exile. He was never allowed to return to the Soviet Union. Solzhenitsyn spent most of his 20-year in exile in the United States on a secluded farm in Vermont. There he finished the second and third volumes of The Gulag Archipelago. With the fall of the Soviet Union, he was finally allowed to go home. In 1994 Solzhenitsyn returned to live in Russia. He continues to be an outspoken critic of governments in both Russia and the West.

WHAT DID YOU LEARN? 1. Describe How did the Soviet authorities try to silence Solzhenitsyn?

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______2. Make Inferences In spite of harassment from the government, Solzhenitsyn kept writing. Why do you think he did this?

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ACTIVITY Reread the section above that begins “As you read the biography below.” Then jot down some notes about the role of those who tell the truth in open and in closed societies. Then write a speech that Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn might have given at the Nobel Prize awards, when representatives of countries around the world would be listening.