Prussian Nights: A Poem by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This long-form narrative poem tells a tale of inhumanity in the Soviet advance toward Germany during the Second World War. The narrator is a run-of-the-mill soldier who witnesses rape and murder by his comrades. Solzhenitsyn was a young officer in the military during the war, and it's probable that the story of the poem draws from his real-world experience during the war. It's said that he composed and memorized the poem while he was in the Gulag.
While the poem's story focuses on violence and inhumanity perpetrated by some soldiers, it isn't particularly graphic in its description. Rather, the author sets up scenes and leaves it to the reader's imagination to fill in the blanks. It's also true that in some cases the narrator is witnessing the aftermath of violence and not the act itself. It's not a pretty story, but readers needn't be concerned it will be gratuitously graphic.
While the translator chose to stick to rhyming verse, the poem is quite readable. The story is told in a straightforward fashion. Many will find this appealing because the readability is high. However, others may find the lack of metaphor and poetic approaches to language to make for unappealing poetry. There's not a lot of symbolism and the meanings seem quite literal. That said, the imagery is often vivid and evocative, and the metered verse reads smoothly and lyrically.
The book has a feature that I like, which is the original [Russian] is on the left-hand page with the English translation, produced by Robert Conquest, on the right. The translation didn't come in greatly useful for me. I had two years of Russian back in college, but that was a long time ago and I read Cyrillic with the unconfident stammer of a first grader. Still, it's interesting to get a taste of the original.
I'd recommend this book, regardless of whether one is a poetry reader. The story can be read as just that, a story, and it offers insight into the ugly inhumanity too often set free in the act of warring.
View all my reviews