Stalingrad

by Vasily Grossman

  •

  In his December 1950 letter to Stalin, Grossman wrote that there were already almost as many pages of internal reviews, stenograms of meetings, etc., as there were pages in the novel itself. A comprehensive study of the four main typescripts and three published editions could easily end up still longer. We shall limit ourselves to a brief mention, chapter by chapter, of the most striking differences.

  PART ONE

  1–2. These chapters were omitted in 1952 and 1954. They are identical in the third version and the 1956 edition.

  3–5. Similar in all variants. Some of the bleaker aspects of the lives of Soviet peasants—the details of Vavilov’s backbreaking work, the family’s grief over the dead cow, the meagreness of the food Vavilov takes away in his knapsack, even the mention of the cockroaches under the floor—are from the third version. The grim paragraph beginning “Vavilov saw the war as a catastrophe” is also from this version. So are Pukhov’s sharpest criticisms, his positive attitude towards the Germans and the passage about the loss of his sons. And so is much of the portrait of the corrupt kolkhoz chairman.

  A condensed version of these chapters was included in By the Volga (1949).

  6. The mention of Sofya and Alexandra having got to know each other in Paris and Bern are from the third version—one of many instances where the published editions omit mention of the older characters’ lives in Western Europe. We have also followed this version for the details of the food consumed at the dinner. In the published editions, the meal is more modest, with no butter, sturgeon or caviar and only one half-litre of vodka.

  7. In general, Grossman’s editors seem to have wanted to tone everything down, to make everything smoother and more even. Anything comic or absurd in the third version is less so in the published editions. In the published versions of this chapter, for example, there is no mention of Seryozha’s ambition to eclipse both Newton and Einstein.

  And as already mentioned—in the third version and in 1956, Seryozha’s mess tin was “stolen”; in 1952 and 1954, it “disappeared.”

  8. Most of Mostovskoy’s sociological analysis of Alexandra’s room is from the third version. In the published editions, he just says that the books (Marx, Hegel and Lenin) and the two portraits remind him of his apartment in Leningrad. He does not mention either her merchant father or her prosperous son-in-law. And in the published editions Alexandra is unshakably positive. Instead of ending one of her speeches to Mostovskoy with the words “Some kind of darkness has fallen on us,” she says, “No, no, we’ll stop the fascists. Of course we’ll stop them.”

  9. For Mostovskoy’s speech about Antaeus, we have followed not the 1956 edition, but the 1952 and 1954 editions. In 1956, Stalin has been edited out and Mostovskoy begins, “I am sure you remember the myth about the giant Antaeus.” This makes little sense. Mostovskoy would not suddenly bring up a Greek myth had Stalin not recently mentioned this myth in a public speech. The deletion of the mention of Stalin is a clear instance of Grossman’s editors struggling, after Khrushchev’s criticisms of Stalin in 1956, to minimize the number of references to him.

  For Alexandra’s reminiscences about pies, we have followed the third version. However unwittingly, she makes it all too clear that exile was a great deal more pleasant under the tsarist regime than in Soviet days. This passage was omitted in 1952 and 1954; it was included in 1956, but heavily abridged. Mostovskoy’s memories of his Easter meal in prison were also omitted from the published editions.

  In the published editions, Vera’s friends borrow copies not of Conan Doyle or Rider Haggard, but of How the Steel Was Tempered by Nikolay Ostrovsky (1904–36). A classic of socialist realism, this novel was first published serially in 1932–34. Copies would not have been difficult to obtain. Conan Doyle was genuinely popular at this time, in spite of some degree of official disapproval.

  For the last two pages of this chapter, from “There was a general silence” to “everyone turned to look at him,” we have followed the third version. Grossman was clearly enraged by the suspicion with which the Soviet establishment looked on the hundreds of thousands of men encircled by the Germans during the first year of the war; many were sent to penal battalions, sentenced to years in the camps or shot. The 1952 and 1954 editions omit Kovalyov’s words about bureaucrats collaborating with the Germans; the 1956 edition includes this passage, though much toned down.

  Andreyev’s bleak words about truth are from the third version.

  10. Here we have followed the 1956 edition. In the third version Seryozha, when playing with the cat, imitates not Marusya’s voice but that of Jenny Genrikhovna. And the 1952 and 1954 editions omit the lines about Seryozha pretending to headbutt the cat and calling him a “little ram!” Evidently this was considered too silly for a novel on a theme as important as the Battle of Stalingrad.

  11. Pavel Andreyev’s criticism of Mostovskoy’s internationalism as being like the teachings of Christ is from the third version.

  12. The mention of the anarchist philosopher Mikhail Bakunin is from the third version. Even the mentions of Lake Geneva and Marx’s grave in London, present in the typescript, were first published only in 1954; in 1952 it was evidently considered safer to omit all references to Mostovskoy’s years as an exile in Western Europe, as if this might have made him too much of an internationalist and less truly Russian.

  13. For Agrippina not eating anything with her vodka, her words about prayers “being said in every one of the churches” and her envious complaints about Mostovskoy, we have followed the third version. In the published editions there is no mention of his trips to the Caucasus, and his pension is only a thousand roubles. And the last paragraphs are blander, omitting the word “whore,” the suggestion that this woman may be signalling to the Germans, and the threat of shooting.

  14. Similar in all variants.

  15. The mention of the nature of Sitnikov’s wound—and of the suspicion with which he was evidently treated—is from the third version. The description of Viktorov lying on the stretcher also follows the third version; in the published editions, the comparison with the clubbed turkey is omitted, and his underwear is “worn,” not “soiled.” A condensed version of this chapter was included in By the Volga (1949); here his underwear is “unwashed.”

  16. This chapter about Alexandra first appears only in the fifth version. It may represent a compromise on Grossman’s part; his editors may have demanded that he emphasize Alexandra’s empathy with Soviet workers. It would be wrong, however, to dismiss the chapter for this reason. As always, Grossman was determined to write truthfully, and some of his truthfulness was clearly found unacceptable. The paragraph about the “vicious powers” of chemistry, for example, was omitted in both 1952 and 1954.

  The startlingly bold paragraph about Dmitry Shaposhnikov, present in the fifth version, was also first published only in 1956. In the earlier editions, Dmitry dies of a heart attack brought about by “major unpleasantnesses” (krupnye nepriyatnosti) at work. His wife—Seryozha’s mother—then goes to work in the far north; after Seryozha twice catches pneumonia, she agrees to let him live with Alexandra in Stalingrad.

  In the fifth version Grossman states that Dmitry was working on the White Sea Canal. Grossman’s editors may have required him to omit this for political reasons, but mention of the canal would, in any case, have been anachronistic; Dmitry was arrested in 1937 and the White Sea Canal, the first of Stalin’s major slave-labour projects, was built between 1931 and 1934. Nevertheless, the 1956 edition still preserves a faint trace of the White Sea Canal: “empty shore [. . .] white foam [. . .] seagulls [. . .] white head.”

  17. This chapter is not present in the third version; we have not yet established in which version it first appears.

  18. An entire page of this chapter, from Marusya’s “You should paint posters,” is from the third version. Neither the argument about truth, nor Zina’s stories about Kiev, nor the discussion of the possibility of Alexandra staying in Stalingrad appea
r in the published editions.

  19. Similar in all variants. Some of Novikov’s apologies and the humorous mentions of his readiness to subordinate himself to Zhenya are from the third version. A Soviet colonel was evidently not supposed to subordinate himself to a woman.

  20. The paragraph about Novikov’s extreme correctness—his being as “scrupulously fair as a pair of pharmaceutical scales”—is from the third version.

  21. The emphasis on Novikov’s sense of shame is from the third version. This version also includes several pages from Novikov’s notebook. Some of Novikov’s reflections were later given to Darensky and incorporated in the published editions (III, 6) as a part of his notebook.

  22. Similar in all variants.

  23. At the beginning of the chapter we have omitted almost a page from the published editions—a long summary of military developments that does not appear in the third version. In 1952 and 1954 the Soviet defeats mentioned in this account are excused by the Allies’ failure to open a second front; this assertion of the Soviet official line was omitted in 1956.

  The cockroach “scuttling across the map” and the secretary “conscientiously minut[ing] decisions never to be put into effect” are from the third version. The page beginning “The speed of the retreat,” with the vivid image of Novikov as a cinema operator, is also from this version—as is the reference to Heraclitus near the end of the chapter.

  24. Some of the account of Major Berozkin’s regiment—that it is advancing west under orders from Major Berozkin(!), and that the women looked at his men as if they were “holy martyrs”—is from the third version. Novikov’s criticism of Bykov—that he is like a scientist explaining just how and why a boat is going under when he should be trying to plug the holes in the hull—is also from this version.

  25. This chapter, present in a slightly different form in the third version, was first published only in 1956. But in 1956 Cheprak is a great deal more positive as he says goodbye to Novikov. Instead of saying, “That’ll be the end of you,” he says, “I think that’s a good decision.”

  26. Three important passages are from the third version: the report of Timoshenko bathing in the Volga, the lines about his men having “lost all faith in themselves and their future”; and the two paragraphs about the symbolic importance of this “mass baptism” in the Volga.

  27. Similar in all variants—though the published editions omit many interesting details: e.g. the scientist who talks about his life being “essential to science,” Ludmila’s pine-needle baths and courses of “photo-, electro-, and hydrotherapy,” and Varya’s bartering in the market.

  28. This chapter was first published—heavily edited—in 1956. Among the details we have taken from the third version are the students’ jokes about the importance of having the right social origin; the passage about Sofya and Alexandra spending time together in Paris; Abarchuk’s joke—if that’s what it is—about having sex with a monkey; his belief that it was impossible to eradicate the contagion of bourgeois ideology from the psyche of anyone with a bourgeois parent or grandparent; his guarded yet ominous words about what should be done with such people; and Alexandra’s remark about people who “don’t know how to reconcile love of humanity and love for an actual person.”

  29. Similar in all variants, though the seemingly innocuous paragraph beginning “Her love for her son” was first published only in 1956. No doubt, it was considered too silly to be included for a novel on such an epic theme.

  30. Here we have followed the 1956 edition. The third version is similar, but more detailed. Viktor’s mother’s love and concern for his well-being is still more obsessive. Olga Ignatievna’s apartment is still more exotic, her aquarium still more splendid. Part of the argument between Viktor and the director of the Physics Institute—the six paragraphs from “‘Ivan Dmitrievich,’ Viktor had said”—was omitted in 1952 and 1954.

  31. The quarrel between Viktor and Ludmila is a great deal more serious in the third version than in the published editions. Here we have stayed closer to the third version, taking from it the eight sentences from “Sometimes I need your heart” to “quarrels and disagreements.”

  32. The first three paragraphs were omitted in 1952 and 1954, evidently because they emphasize Viktor’s Jewish background. Here and elsewhere, the third version puts more emphasis than the published editions on the importance to Viktor of his relationship with his mother. The long paragraph about his mother’s readiness to sacrifice herself for him, for example, was omitted from all the published editions.

  The comparison of nuclear energy with a sleeping bear or a vast fish is also from the third version; Grossman’s editors probably saw such comparisons as too extravagant, too far from the realism they were required to promote.

  33. In the 1952 edition there is great emphasis, throughout the chapter, on Chepyzhin’s breadth of interests, his worldwide fame and his importance to his students; in this first publication of the novel Chepyzhin played not just a “big” (as in 1956), but a “decisive” role in the formation of Viktor’s scientific worldview.

  The ten paragraphs at the end of the chapter, from “Viktor remembered a conversation about Chepyzhin with Krymov,” first appeared in 1954. Though Grossman had introduced Chepyzhin only to meet Fadeyev’s demands, several reviewers of the 1952 edition criticized Grossman for giving so much space to Chepyzhin’s “homespun philosophizing.” Krymov’s attack on Chepyzhin may have been introduced to counter this criticism.

  34. Some of the items in Viktor’s suitcase, including the boiled water and the half-litre bottles of vodka for bribes, are from the third version. Several of the less dignified episodes in the first half of the chapter are also from this version. These include Viktor’s account of his train journey during the Civil War, people’s unsympathetic responses to the woman from the kolkhoz, and the account of the pugnacious drunk. Because of other changes to the structure of this and later chapters, it was impossible to reinstate another interesting episode from this version: Postoev’s discovery, in the train, that he too has been robbed; that the suitcase with his provisions, including the roast chicken, is now empty.

  The lines from “And after Stenka Razin” to “baffling to the mind” were omitted in 1952 and 1954. It was evidently unacceptable, during the first decade after the war, to suggest that, after serious discussion of the likelihood of the Germans reaching the Volga, Russians could have slipped so quickly into singing light-hearted songs.

  35. About thirty lines of this chapter are from the third version. These include the passages about the birthday greetings telegrams, Anna Semyonovna’s need to work and be financially independent and the words of Yiddish she quotes in her letters. The omission of these passages from the published editions must have been another of the compromises required of Grossman. In order to keep Viktor Shtrum in the novel, he clearly had to give less space to his personal life and his Jewish background.

  36. The entire account of Viktor and Ludmila’s quarrel is from the third version, as is much of what Maximov says about the stifling of free speech in Czechoslovakia. In the published editions, Maximov has not actually written his article but has merely come to talk to Viktor about fascism. And his last words—about how gardening could save the world from fascism and war—are omitted.

  The account of Viktor listening to Stalin’s speech is not present in the third version. In the 1952 and 1954 editions, it takes up about two pages, while in 1956 it takes up only five lines. Since this speech is historically important, and since Grossman was clearly, in 1956, under strong pressure to minimize Stalin’s role in the war, we have inserted from the 1954 edition the two paragraphs beginning “Stalin had then asked.” It is possible that Grossman might have wanted to restore more of this speech; it is hard to judge.

  The description of Viktor’s autumn 1941 train journey to Kazan, present in the third version, was omitted in 1952 and 1954. Its realism was, no doubt, seen as too negative.

  37. All three published editi
ons omit the emphasis on the importance of the Hotel Moscow’s supplies of vodka. The 1952 and 1954 editions omit the account of Postoev’s dealings with the hotel manager; his shameless assertion of his entitlement to privilege must have disconcerted Grossman’s editors.

  By far the most important of the four scientists mentioned by the hotel manager is the biologist and plant breeder Nikolay Vavilov, one of the many victims of Stalin’s purges. Vavilov was arrested and sentenced to death in 1941—in part because of his contacts with foreign scientists and in part because of his disagreements with Trofim Lysenko, a charlatan who was a favourite of Stalin’s. Vavilov’s death sentence was commuted to twenty years of imprisonment, but in 1943 he died of starvation in prison. In 1955 his sentence was posthumously reversed and by the 1960s he was hailed as one of the most important of Soviet scientists.

  Grossman’s several versions of this passage differ a great deal from one another. In the third version, he writes, “The hotel manager could remember with astonishing exactness the numbers of the rooms in which Fersman, Vedeneyev and Lysenko had stayed, though he seemed to have little idea which of them was a geologist and which a metallurgist.” Grossman includes three names but only two professions—as if preferring not even to dignify Lysenko with the title of a biologist.

  The much shorter 1952 version of this chapter entirely omits this paragraph. But in the 1954 and 1956 editions, the name of Lysenko is replaced by that of Vavilov. Given that Vavilov was rehabilitated only in 1955, this was daring on Grossman’s part. As in the third version, there is a mismatch between the number of names mentioned and the number of professions. Here, though, this mismatch serves a different purpose. It is Grossman’s way of hinting that there may be something he is unable to say straight-out. Vavilov certainly does deserve to be called a biologist, but in the eyes of the state he is a criminal.