Journal entry by Al Negstad — 2 minutes ago
In each issue of the weekly The Economist, is a section of book reviews. In the June 8th 2019, edition among the books reviewed are, Stalingrad: A Novel, Vasily Grossman, and, Vasily Grossman and the Soviet Century, Alexandra Popoff. The Economist, says about Grossman, "A newly translated masterpiece confirms Vasily Gossman's status as the second world war's greatest bard."
To quote further, "In an article he wrote in 1946 Grossman affirmed: 'There is nothing more precious than human life; its loss is final and irreplaceable.'...Yet as a fine journalist, then a peerless novelist of the horrors of war and tyranny, his destiny was to inhabit times and places that ground up human beings by the million. In his novel 'Stalingrad', which is now only being published in English, the sight of a dying old woman on a bombed out boulevard prompts the anguished question: 'Human suffering. Will it be remembered in centuries to come?' Or will the tears and despair disappear like 'the smoke and dust blown across the steppe by the wind?' Grossman's oeuvre, which includes what may be the greatest fiction of the second world war in any language, has helped salvage that suffering from oblivion." P. 75
Before I entered the land of grief I may have read "There is nothing more precious than human life; its loss is final and irreplaceable" without stopping to think about it. With new sensitivity acquired in the land of grief I now recognize this as a powerful affirmation of a profound truth. Learning, learning, learning....
Trygve has tonsillitis!
Takk for alt,
Al
Trygve pictured running in the grass.
To quote further, "In an article he wrote in 1946 Grossman affirmed: 'There is nothing more precious than human life; its loss is final and irreplaceable.'...Yet as a fine journalist, then a peerless novelist of the horrors of war and tyranny, his destiny was to inhabit times and places that ground up human beings by the million. In his novel 'Stalingrad', which is now only being published in English, the sight of a dying old woman on a bombed out boulevard prompts the anguished question: 'Human suffering. Will it be remembered in centuries to come?' Or will the tears and despair disappear like 'the smoke and dust blown across the steppe by the wind?' Grossman's oeuvre, which includes what may be the greatest fiction of the second world war in any language, has helped salvage that suffering from oblivion." P. 75
Before I entered the land of grief I may have read "There is nothing more precious than human life; its loss is final and irreplaceable" without stopping to think about it. With new sensitivity acquired in the land of grief I now recognize this as a powerful affirmation of a profound truth. Learning, learning, learning....
Trygve has tonsillitis!
Takk for alt,
Al
Trygve pictured running in the grass.
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