* * This is a revised and enlarged version of an earlier torrent * *


ALEKSANDR ISAYEVICH SOLZHENITSYN (1918-2008) was a Russian novelist, historian, and critic of Soviet totalitarianism who was instrumental in raising global awareness of the gulag and the Soviet Union's forced labor camp system.  He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1970 "for the ethical force with which he has pursued the indispensable traditions of Russian literature."  He was expelled from the USSR in 1974 but returned in 1994 after its dissolution.

Arrested in 1945 for criticizing Stalin's regime, he served eight years in Russian prisons and labor camps.  Upon his release in 1953 he was sent into "internal exile" in Asiatic Russia.  After Stalin's death, Solzhenitsyn was released from his exile and began writing in earnest.  It was during these years of imprisonment and later internal exile that Solzhenitsyn abandoned Marxism and developed the philosophical and religious positions of his later life, gradually becoming a philosophically-minded Christian as a result of his experience in prison and the camps.

His first publication, ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH (1962), appeared in the Soviet literary magazine Novy Mir during the somewhat less repressive atmosphere of Khrushchev's regime.  The story is set in a Soviet labor camp in the 1950s and describes a single, gruelling day of an ordinary prisoner.  Its publication was an extraordinary event in Soviet literary history since never before had an account of Stalinist repression been openly distributed.  Two translations are included here, but that by H. T. Willetts is the only one based on the canonical Russian text and the only one authorized by Solzhenitsyn.

Soviet officials soon clamped down on Solzhenitsyn and other Russian artists, and henceforth his works had to be secreted out of Russia in order to be published.  These works included the semi-autobiographical novel CANCER WARD (1968) and THE FIRST CIRCLE (1968), originally published in a self-censored or "distorted" version (an English translation of the full version was eventually published in 2009).

Solzhenitsyn considered THE RED WHEEL his greatest work.  An ambitious cycle of novels published in four parts and consuming more than 6000 pages, each volume concentrates on a critical moment or "knot" in the history of the Russian Revolution.  Only the first two knots have been published in English translation: AUGUST 1914 (1971) and NOVEMBER 1916 (1983).  It is unknown when or if the concluding volumes, March 1917 (Knot III) and April 1917 (Knot IV) will appear.  In late 2013, Joseph Pearce, a Solzhenitsyn scholar who has worked with the author's sons in promoting an English-language edition of THE RED WHEEL in its entirety, stated: "If all goes well this should see the light of day by 2018, the centenary of the great man's birth."

The massive three-volume, seven-part GULAG ARCHIPELAGO (1973-1978) has sold over thirty million copies in thirty-five languages.  It was based upon Solzhenitsyn's own experience, the testimony of 256 former prisoners ("zeks"), and Solzhenitsyn's own research into the history of the penal system.  According to fellow gulag historian Anne Applebaum, THE GULAG ARCHIPELAGO’S rich and varied authorial voice, its unique weaving together of personal testimony, philosophical analysis, and historical investigation, and its unrelenting indictment of communist ideology, made it one of the most consequential books of the 20th century.

In addition to the above works, this collection also includes short stories, novellas, plays, essays and other non-fiction prose.


The following books are in PDF and/or ePUB format as indicated:

* APRICOT JAM & OTHER STORIES (Counterpoint, 2011).  Translated by Kenneth Lantz and Stephan Solzhenitsyn. -- ePUB

* AUGUST 1914: The Red Wheel, Knot I (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1989/2014).  Translated by Harry T. Willetts. -- PDF + ePUB

* CANCER WARD  (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1969/2013).  Translated by Nicholas Bethell and David Burg. -- PDF + ePUB

* CANDLE IN THE WIND (University of Minnesota Press, 1973).  Translated by Keith Armes in association with Arthur Hudgins. -- PDF

* DÉTENTE: Prospects for Democracy and Dictatorship (Transaction, 1980). -- PDF

* THE FIRST CIRCLE (Collins, 1968).  Translated by Michael Guybon. -- ePUB

* FOR THE GOOD OF THE CAUSE (Praeger, 1964).  Translated by David Floyd and Max Hayward. -- PDF

* THE GULAG ARCHIPELAGO, 1918-1956: An Experiment in Literary Investigation (Harper & Row, 1974-78).  3 volumes.  Translated by Thomas P. Whitney (Vols. 1-2) and Harry T. Willetts (Vol. 3). -- PDF + ePUB

* THE GULAG ARCHIPELAGO, 1918-1956: An Experiment in Literary Investigation - Abridged Edition (Harvill, 1986).  Translated by Thomas P. Whitney and Harry T. Willetts; abridged by Edward E. Ericson, Jr. -- ePUB

* IN THE FIRST CIRCLE: The Restored Text (HarperPerennial, 2009).  Translated by Harry T. Willetts. -- ePUB

* THE LOVE-GIRL AND THE INNOCENT (Bantam, 1971).  Translated by Nicholas Bethell and David Burg. -- PDF

* NOVEMBER 1916: The Red Wheel, Knot II (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1999).  Translated by Harry T. Willetts. -- ePUB

* ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH (Bantam, 1967 / Crane, 2013).  Translated by Max Hayward and Ronald Hingley. -- PDF + ePUB

* ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2005).  Translated by Harry T. Willetts, with an Introduction by Katherine Shonk. -- ePUB

* REBUILDING RUSSIA: Reflections and Tentative Proposals (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1991).  Translated by Alexis Klimoff. -- PDF

* STORIES AND PROSE POEMS (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1971).  Translated by Michael Glenny. -- PDF

* TWO HUNDRED YEARS TOGETHER (n.p., n.d.).  Excerpts by an unknown translator. -- PDF

* THE VOICE OF FREEDOM (AFL-CIO, [1975?]).  Translation of two speeches delivered to the AFL-CIO, June-July 1975. -- PDF

* "WE NEVER MAKE MISTAKES": Two Short Novels (Norton, 1971).  Translated by Paul W. Blackstock. -- PDF

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