Friday, November 24, 2006
A Good Day
I recently returned from a brief trip to New York City, my birthplace and home for almost half my life. A questionable fact that writers (at least those living in New York) accept as true is that 80 percent of the country's writers live in this place where, it is also true, enough stories are generated in 24 hours to keep a writer busy for as many years. So, a few will follow as I digest and chew them through.
But first, the novel that accompanied me on the bus trip. It is a classic, and one I have read before: Alexander Solzhenistsyn's "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich." Briefly, the plot is this. The scene is a gulag in Siberia where, during Stalin's reign, millions suffered and millions died for crimes never committed. The "zeks," the prisoners, live in frozen huts, work on mindless projects, wear rags, eat watery gruel, and at any time can be beaten or thrown "in the hole" at a guard's whim. And their sentence is virtually endless: When the ten years are over, they are given ten years more.
At the end of the day, we are with Shukhov, an ordinary zek who shows us that humans can, even in most brutal of institutions, take pride in their work (even if without purpose), and in humor (even if without laughter), and in caring for one another (even if risking punishment).
He is in his straw bunk, looking forward to five hours of sleep before beginning the next workday on the tundra, where the temperature is thirty below zero.
Solzhenitsyn writes: "Shukhov felt pleased with life as he went to sleep. A lot of good things had happened that day." Among them was an extra bowl of oat gruel at dinner, an extra chunk of bread, some tobacco bought from another inmate, a slice of sausage and two biscuits (one of which he gave away) bestowed by a "wealthy" zek who received a parcel from home, and he really enjoyed the day's work, building a wall as good as it could be.
"The end of an unclouded day. Almost a happy one."
Happy Thanks-giving,
Candace
But first, the novel that accompanied me on the bus trip. It is a classic, and one I have read before: Alexander Solzhenistsyn's "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich." Briefly, the plot is this. The scene is a gulag in Siberia where, during Stalin's reign, millions suffered and millions died for crimes never committed. The "zeks," the prisoners, live in frozen huts, work on mindless projects, wear rags, eat watery gruel, and at any time can be beaten or thrown "in the hole" at a guard's whim. And their sentence is virtually endless: When the ten years are over, they are given ten years more.
At the end of the day, we are with Shukhov, an ordinary zek who shows us that humans can, even in most brutal of institutions, take pride in their work (even if without purpose), and in humor (even if without laughter), and in caring for one another (even if risking punishment).
He is in his straw bunk, looking forward to five hours of sleep before beginning the next workday on the tundra, where the temperature is thirty below zero.
Solzhenitsyn writes: "Shukhov felt pleased with life as he went to sleep. A lot of good things had happened that day." Among them was an extra bowl of oat gruel at dinner, an extra chunk of bread, some tobacco bought from another inmate, a slice of sausage and two biscuits (one of which he gave away) bestowed by a "wealthy" zek who received a parcel from home, and he really enjoyed the day's work, building a wall as good as it could be.
"The end of an unclouded day. Almost a happy one."
Happy Thanks-giving,
Candace
