Life and Fate: P.1, Ch.1-25

1/ For years I have wanted to read Life and Fate, the Soviet War and Peace, but often hesitated, partly because I felt unready to immerse myself in a novel about the horrors of the 20th century, and partly because the quotes people often used to promote the book gave me the impression that the writing was dry and flat.

That turns out not to be the case.

For example, see this passage of the oil tanks on fire (translated by Robert Chandler): 

“It seemed impossible to escape from the liquid fire. It leaped up, humming and crackling, from the streams of oil that were filling the hollows and craters and rushing down the communication trenches. Saturated with oil, even the clay and stone were beginning to smoke. The oil itself was gushing out in black glossy streams from tanks that had been riddled by incendiary bullets; it was as though sheets of flame and smoke had been sealed inside these tanks and were now slowly unrolling.

The life that had reigned hundreds of millions of years before, the terrible life of the primeval monsters, had broken out of its deep tombs; howling and roaring, stamping its huge feet, it was devouring everything round about. […]

The columns of flame and smoke looked at one moment like living beings seized by horror and fury, at another moment like quivering poplars and aspens. Like women with long, streaming hair, the black clouds and red flames joined together in a wild dance.” (P.1, ch.9) 

That’s an interesting image. 

This is a battle scene: 

“Dim figures appeared out of the darkness, rifles flashed, red and green eyes gleamed momentarily, and the air was full of the whistle of iron. He seemed to be looking into a vast pit full of hundreds of poisonous snakes that were slithering about in confusion, hissing and rustling through the dry grass.” (P.1, ch.10) 

And: 

“It was as though a huge black cauldron were boiling and Krymov were immersed, body and soul, in its gurgling, bubbling waters. He could no longer think or feel as he had ever thought or felt before. For a moment he seemed to be in control of the whirlpool that had seized hold of him; then a thick black pitch seemed to pour into his eyes and nostrils – there was no air left to breathe, no stars over his head, nothing but this darkness, this ravine and these strange creatures rustling through the dry grass.” (ibid.) 

Vasily Grossman has a plain, straightforward style, like Tolstoy and Chekhov—his sentences don’t draw attention to themselves—but it’s neither dry nor flat, and the book is engrossing. 

2/ Vasily Grossman’s main idea—his hatred of Big Ideas and the concept of The Greater Good—is established quite early on. 

“‘[…] On the fifteenth of September last year I watched twenty thousand Jews being executed – women, children and old men. That day I understood that God could not allow such a thing and that therefore he did not exist…’” (P.1, ch.4) 

That is said by Ikonnikov, one of the Russian prisoners in the German camp. 

“This was a long-cherished dream: he had believed that communist agricultural labour would bring about the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.

During the period of all-out collectivization he had seen special trains packed with the families of kulaks. He had seen exhausted men and women collapse in the snow, never to rise again. He had seen ‘closed’ villages where there wasn’t a living soul in sight and where every door and window had been boarded up. He remembered one ragged peasant woman with an emaciated neck and swarthy hands. Her guards had been staring at her in horror: mad with hunger, she had just eaten her two children.” (ibid.) 

He used to believe in God, and used to be a Tolstoyan—but not anymore.

This is the important passage: 

“‘[…] I saw the sufferings of the peasantry with my own eyes – and yet collectivization was carried out in the name of Good. I don’t believe in your “Good”. I believe in human kindness.’

‘So you want us to be horrified when Hitler and Himmler are strung up on the gallows in the name of Good? You can count me out!’

‘You ask Hitler,’ said Ikonnikov, ‘and he’ll tell you that even this camp was set up in the name of Good.’” (ibid.) 

Ikonnikov is talking (to Mostovskoy, an Old Bolshevik), but you can tell that that view is shared by the author himself. And this is something I too feel strongly: I have seen what one Big Idea did to my country, and now in the West I can see the way Big Ideas kill reason and nuance, destroy prestigious institutions, and make many people no longer see others as individuals. 

I wonder what Nabokov would have thought about Life and Fate—the book was smuggled out of the Soviet Union and not published till 1980, 3 years after Nabokov’s death—he and Vasily Grossman both strongly advocated for freedom and the individual.  

3/ I think at the beginning of the novel, Vasily Grossman isn’t very good at helping the reader remember and keep track of characters. Tolstoy for example usually pins down a detail or a gesture, then repeats it, and he follows a character long enough to make an impression. Life and Fate, at least at the beginning, is more episodic and seems to move more quickly from one group of characters to another. 

It’s different when he introduces the main character, Viktor Pavlovich Shtrum, in chapter 15, together with Viktor’s wife Lyudmila, her mother Alexandra Vladimirovna, and Viktor and Lyudmila’s daughter Nadya. They’re all distinct, and Grossman very quickly conveys the relationships between the characters—the strains, the difficulties, the conflicts. It’s very good, especially his depiction of the strained relationship between Viktor and Lyudmila.

And when I’ve read Viktor’s mother’s letter, which is heartbreaking, I have no doubt that Life and Fate would be a powerful novel. 

“And what a lot of children like that there are! […] Though sometimes they do begin laughing and fighting and romping about; then, rather than feeling happier, I am seized with horror.

They say that children are our own future, but how can one say that of these children? They aren’t going to become musicians, cobblers or tailors. Last night I saw very clearly how this whole noisy world of bearded, anxious fathers and querulous grandmothers who bake honey-cakes and goose-necks – this whole world of marriage customs, proverbial sayings and Sabbaths will disappear for ever under the earth. After the war life will begin to stir once again, but we won’t be here, we will have vanished – just as the Aztecs once vanished.” (P.1, ch.18)

There are many books and films about the Holocaust that feel false and hollow, even exploitative; many books and films that make one think the authors set their works against such a horrifying backdrop as an easy way to shock, to move, to haunt the audience, without having to work for it.  

Life and Fate isn’t one of them.

I think it’s partly because it’s personal to Vasily Grossman (he was a war reporter and his mother was killed by the Nazis), and partly because he retains the “coolness” of a journalist—there’s nothing excessive or mawkish when he writes about those horrors.

It’s also powerful because Grossman has a large vision: he depicts anti-Semitism, and also writes about anti-German sentiments during the war, even towards Germans in the Soviet Union who are against Hitler; he describes human suffering, and also includes a haunting story about a cat… This may just be my first impression, but Life and Fate seems to be a very humane novel. 

4/ Like War and Peace, Life and Fate has War scenes and Peace scenes. The difference is that the Peace scenes in Vasily Grossman’s novel don’t really have the warmth, the joy found in Tolstoy’s novel: because the characters are living in a totalitarian society. 

“He spoke straightforwardly and openly, seemingly as straightforwardly as the manager of a knitwear factory or a teacher at a technical institute might talk about their work. But they all understood that this openness and freedom were only apparent – he knew better than any of them what could, and what could not, be talked about. Getmanov, who also loved to shock people by his boldness and candour, was well aware of the depths concealed beneath the surface of this animated and spontaneous conversation.” (P.1, ch.21) 

Then Getmanov’s brother-in-law makes a blunder.

“The void surrounding Nikolay Terentyevich grew still more unpleasant. He had spoken about something that should never be mentioned, even in jest.” (ibid.) 

And:

“The explicitness of Getmanov’s reproach was a sign that he would think no more of Nikolay Terentyevich’s blunder. Sagaydak and Mashuk nodded approvingly.

Galina’s brother understood that this stupid, trivial incident would be forgotten; he also understood that it would not be forgotten entirely.” (ibid.) 

I can see that Life and Fate would be much darker than War and Peace—and of course, Grossman writes about fascism, communism, and the Holocaust.

“The sacrifices made by Getmanov in the name of Party loyalty were sometimes cruel. In this world neighbours from the same village or teachers to whom one had been indebted since youth no longer existed; love or sympathy were no longer to be reckoned with.” (ibid.) 

But Vasily Grossman isn’t simplistic. In the following chapter, he lets us see Getmanov in a different setting—when he’s looking at his sleeping children—and he appears in a different light:

“He felt a piercing ache of tenderness, anxiety and pity for them. He desperately wanted to embrace his son and daughters and kiss their sleeping faces. He was overwhelmed by a helpless tenderness, an unreasoning love; he felt lost, weak and confused.” (P.1, ch.22) 

5/ The chapters about Lyudmila’s sister Yevgenia and her struggle to get a residence permit are interesting (and relatable), but I won’t write about them.

Instead, here’s an interesting image about Yevgenia’s neighbour:  

“If Shargorodsky turned round abruptly, it looked as though his big, grey, alabaster head would come off his fine neck and fall to the ground with a crash.” (P.1, ch.25) 

In a very realistic, very sober novel such as Life and Fate, that unusual image rather jumps at me.