Comments on: Prospect online this week http://blog.prospectblogs.com/2008/08/05/prospect-online-this-week-28/ Fri, 21 Nov 2008 17:47:40 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.3 By: Garreth Byrne http://blog.prospectblogs.com/2008/08/05/prospect-online-this-week-28/#comment-5034 Garreth Byrne Thu, 07 Aug 2008 16:44:04 +0000 http://blog.prospectblogs.com/?p=778#comment-5034 Solzhenitsyn, like George Orwell, had a puritan ascetic streak. His noted (notorious) Harvard commencement address of 1978 shows that unlike Orwell he was not a socialist, indeed believed that socialist ideas had led to western decadence and tyrannical ideologies on the extreme left and right. Other points in that address pose a challenge to western liberals (called socialists outside America) and I feel that it could serve as a suitable touchstone for academic seminars and debates about the state of western society. People who consider themselves to be on the left will always be uncomfortable about the writings and social critique of Solzhenitsyn. His patriarchal stance on radio and otherwise in post-1991 Russia seems stiltedly masculine to westerners. In other ways, people who consider themselves to be champions of unfettered capitalist materialism will baulk at his religious moralisations. I prefer Orwell as a prose stylist. Orwell's succinct subtle animal fable about stalinist Russia will be read more widely than the longer, graver novels of Solzhenitsyn. Solzhenitsyn, like George Orwell, had a puritan ascetic streak. His noted (notorious) Harvard commencement address of 1978 shows that unlike Orwell he was not a socialist, indeed believed that socialist ideas had led to western decadence and tyrannical ideologies on the extreme left and right. Other points in that address pose a challenge to western liberals (called socialists outside America) and I feel that it could serve as a suitable touchstone for academic seminars and debates about the state of western society. People who consider themselves to be on the left will always be uncomfortable about the writings and social critique of Solzhenitsyn. His patriarchal stance on radio and otherwise in post-1991 Russia seems stiltedly masculine to westerners. In other ways, people who consider themselves to be champions of unfettered capitalist materialism will baulk at his religious moralisations. I prefer Orwell as a prose stylist. Orwell’s succinct subtle animal fable about stalinist Russia will be read more widely than the longer, graver novels of Solzhenitsyn.

]]> By: Alexander de Lorenzo http://blog.prospectblogs.com/2008/08/05/prospect-online-this-week-28/#comment-5030 Alexander de Lorenzo Thu, 07 Aug 2008 07:29:50 +0000 http://blog.prospectblogs.com/?p=778#comment-5030 Dear Sir: Lesley Chamberlain's piece is timely though as something of the last communist among my peers, I should tell you without rancour that Solzhenitsyn's Tales from the Gulag did not "kill off any lingering affection among leftists" in capitalist Europe for the old soviet system. This was never done and still to this day there are many western intellectuals in many history faculties in old Europe chiefly who maintain a discreet attachment to the old soviet ideals and the old communism. Solzhenitsyn was simply not accepted or believed as an objective reporter. Even the damage done by Grossman did but dent our enthusiasm for Lenin worker medals, Sholokov, Nabokov and the rural happiness that soviet communism produced in its prime. So it is a case of till we meet again rather than fare thee well. Grossman has come and gone and even samizdat Solzhenitsyn has now had his day without too much long-term damage to the old ideals. Dosvidanye Tavarichev, Alexander de Lorenzo Dear Sir:

Lesley Chamberlain’s piece is timely though as something of the last communist among my peers, I should tell you without rancour that Solzhenitsyn’s Tales from the Gulag did not “kill off any lingering affection among leftists” in capitalist Europe for the old soviet system.

This was never done and still to this day there are many western intellectuals in many history faculties in old Europe chiefly who maintain a discreet attachment to the old soviet ideals and the old communism. Solzhenitsyn was simply not accepted or believed as an objective reporter. Even the damage done by Grossman did but dent our enthusiasm for Lenin worker medals, Sholokov, Nabokov and the rural happiness that soviet communism produced in its prime.

So it is a case of till we meet again rather than fare thee well.

Grossman has come and gone and even samizdat Solzhenitsyn has now had his day without too much long-term damage to the old ideals.

Dosvidanye Tavarichev,

Alexander de Lorenzo

]]> By: Martyn http://blog.prospectblogs.com/2008/08/05/prospect-online-this-week-28/#comment-5024 Martyn Wed, 06 Aug 2008 14:11:38 +0000 http://blog.prospectblogs.com/?p=778#comment-5024 A good article so it seems a shame to nit-pick - but it is important to emphasise that there were sections of the left that did not "hold a long cherished dream" of Soviet-style communism but were opposed to it. Indeed most of the early criticism of Bolshevism came from the anarchists and the left-communists, who were consequently among the first victims of the regime. One of the reasons for mentioning this is that Solzhenitsyn himself documented some of the anarchist opponents to Leninism and Stalinism, and describes how the black anarchist flag of revolt was raised in the very heart of the Gulag at Vortuka. A good article so it seems a shame to nit-pick - but it is important to emphasise that there were sections of the left that did not “hold a long cherished dream” of Soviet-style communism but were opposed to it. Indeed most of the early criticism of Bolshevism came from the anarchists and the left-communists, who were consequently among the first victims of the regime.

One of the reasons for mentioning this is that Solzhenitsyn himself documented some of the anarchist opponents to Leninism and Stalinism, and describes how the black anarchist flag of revolt was raised in the very heart of the Gulag at Vortuka.

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