Daily Gulag Archipelago Thread

>regular anti-commie thread
>commies don't even bother to show up
>based Archipelago thread
>commie damage control everywhere

Gulag is an important, powerful book. If you are interested in 20th Century history or interested in the future of humanity - this book is required reading. Although this book played a significant role in the dissolution of the Soviet Union, its primary importance is the message it proclaims to the present and to the future. Its message transcends time and place: It reveals the weakness of human character and the strength of the human spirit. It demonstrates the dangers of powerful government, the fragileness of individual freedom, and the never-ending battle between them.

This book is a masterpiece. It is at once despairing and optimistic, tragedy and comedy. This is one of the most powerful books I have ever read. At times I was saddened by human cruelty. At other times I was amazed by acts of courage and determination. And at other times I simply laughed out loud. This is the kind of book that forces you to look into your own heart and to think about how you can become a force for good in your world - at least it did that for me.

This book changed the world once and helped bring an end to the Soviet Union. Let's make it change the world again! 95% of normies would have their whole world view on Socialism turned upside down from reading this book.

>mandatory reading for every child in Russia
>Won a Nobel Peace Prize

I have uploaded the books to TinyUpload in ePub format. There is also full audio versions on YouTube.

Vol.1
s000.tinyupload.com/?file_id=00555597745523139511

Vol. 2
s000.tinyupload.com/?file_id=38363344055726579654

Vol. 3
s000.tinyupload.com/?file_id=34365144803417018396

Previous threads:
145977948
146145393

*Post your favorite excerpts from the book .

Excerpt 1/2

>At the conclusion of the conference, a tribute to Comrade Stalin was called for. Of course, everyone stood up (just as everyone had leaped to his feet during the conference at every mention of his name). ... For three minutes, four minutes, five minutes, the stormy applause, rising to an ovation, continued. But palms were getting sore and raised arms were already aching. And the older people were panting from exhaustion. It was becoming insufferably silly even to those who really adored Stalin.

>However, who would dare to be the first to stop? … After all, NKVD men were standing in the hall applauding and watching to see who would quit first! And in the obscure, small hall, unknown to the leader, the applause went on – six, seven, eight minutes! They were done for! Their goose was cooked! They couldn’t stop now till they collapsed with heart attacks! At the rear of the hall, which was crowded, they could of course cheat a bit, clap less frequently, less vigorously, not so eagerly – but up there with the presidium where everyone could see them?

>The director of the local paper factory, an independent and strong-minded man, stood with the presidium. Aware of all the falsity and all the impossibility of the situation, he still kept on applauding! Nine minutes! Ten! In anguish he watched the secretary of the District Party Committee, but the latter dared not stop. Insanity! To the last man! With make-believe enthusiasm on their faces, looking at each other with faint hope, the district leaders were just going to go on and on applauding till they fell where they stood, till they were carried out of the hall on stretchers! And even then those who were left would not falter…

2/2
>Then, after eleven minutes, the director of the paper factory assumed a businesslike expression and sat down in his seat. And, oh, a miracle took place! Where had the universal, uninhibited, indescribable enthusiasm gone? To a man, everyone else stopped dead and sat down. They had been saved!

>The squirrel had been smart enough to jump off his revolving wheel. That, however, was how they discovered who the independent people were. And that was how they went about eliminating them. That same night the factory director was arrested. They easily pasted ten years on him on the pretext of something quite different. But after he had signed Form 206, the final document of the interrogation, his interrogator reminded him:

>“Don’t ever be the first to stop applauding.”

>muh 60 million killed
What is the limit of people stupidity?

Check out Life & Fate by Vasily Grossman too.

I was going to say 'inb4 butthurt Russian/slavaboo crying' but I was too late

I don't know, but I'm sure if you keep posting we're eventually going to find out.

Believing in Marxism.

An excerpt from "The Gulag Archipelago" ... on how to resist fascism & tyranny. The lesson that is just as important today as it was half a century ago.

"During an arrest, you think since you are not guilty, how can they arrest you? Why should you run away? And how can you resist right then? After all, you’ll only make your situation worse; you will make it more difficult for them to sort out the mistake.

And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say goodbye to his family?

Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?

The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! We did not love freedom enough. Every man always has handy a dozen glib little reasons why he is right not to sacrifice himself."

In case you are in soviet crimes thing i suggest you watch "soviet story" its on youtube

...

...

“And even in the fever of epidemic arrests, when people leaving for work said farewell to their families every day, because they could not be certain they would return at night, even then almost no one tried to run away and only in rare cases did people commit suicide. And that was exactly what was required. A submissive sheep is a find for a wolf.”

A Polack wrote a similar book

1/2

"And an unbridgeable chasm divides you! You cannot cry out to them, nor weep over them, nor shake them by the shoulder: after all you are a disembodied spirit, you are a ghost, and they are material bodies. And how can you bring it home to them? By an inspiration? By a vision? A dream? Brothers! People! Why has life been given to you? In the deep, deaf stillness of midnight, the doors of the death cells are being swung open - and great-souled people are being dragged out to be shot. On all the railroads of the country this very minute, right now, people who have just been fed salt herring are licking their dry lips with bitter tongues. They dream of the happiness of stretching out one's legs and of the relief one feels after going to the toilet. In Orotukan the earth thaws only in summer and only to the depth of three feet - and only then can they bury the bones of those who died during the winter. And you have the right to arrange your own life under the blue sky and the hot sun, to get a drink of water, to stretch, to travel wherever you like without a convoy. So what's this about unwiped feet? And what's this about a mother-in-law? What about the main thing in life, all its riddles? If you want, I'll spell it out for you right now.

2/2

Do not pursue what is illusory - property and position: all that is gained at the expense of your nerves decade after decade, and is confiscated in one fell night. Live with a steady superiority over life - don't be afraid of misfortune, and do not yearn after happiness; it is, after all, all the same: the bitter doesn't last forever, and the sweet never fills the cup to overflowing. It is enough if you don't freeze in the cold and if thirst and hunger don't claw at your insides. If your back isn't broken, if your feet can walk, if both arms can bend, if both eyes see, and if both ears hear, then whom should you envy? And why? Our envy of others devours us most of all. Rub your eyes and purify your heart - and prize above all else in the world those who wish you well. Do not hurt them or scold them, and never part from any of them in anger; after all, you simply do not know: it might be your last act before your arrest, and that will be how you are imprinted in their memory!"

t was so congested in the barracks – yet it kept steadily thinning out. After a certain number of weeks the survivors of the barracks were driven outside for a roll call. In the unaccustomed daylight they saw one another: pale, their faces overgrown with stubble, beaded with nits, hard, dark blue lips, sunken eyes. They called the roll by file cards. The answers were barely audible. The cards to which there was no response were put aside. And that is how they established who was left there in the piles of corpses – avoiding interrogation.

“All who survived Orotukan say they would have preferred the gas chamber.”

Commies will be dealt with appropriately.

“A. B——v has told how executions were carried out at Adak – a camp on the Pechora River. They would take the opposition members ‘with their things’ out of the camp compound on a prisoner transport at night. And outside the compound stood the small house of the Third Section. The condemned men were taken into a room one at a time, and there the camp guards sprang on them. Their mouths were stuffed with something soft and their arms were bound with cords behinds their backs. Then they were led out into the courtyard, where harnessed carts were waiting. The bound prisoners were piled on the carts, from five to seven at a time, and driven off to the ‘Gorka’ – the camp cemetery. On arrival they were tipped into big pits that had already been prepared and buried alive. Not out of brutality, no. It had been ascertained that when dragging and lifting them, it was much easier to cope with living people than with corpses.

A small piece broken off a hacksaw and sharpened was produced (by the thieves). They decided to cut through a solid plank under the bottom bed shelf. Then when the train slowed down, to lower themselves through the gap, drop onto the line, and lie still until the cars had passed over them. True, the experts said that at the end of the cattle train carrying prisoners there was usually a drag – a metal scraper, with teeth which passed close to the ties, caught the body of anyone trying to escape, and dragged him over the ties to his death.

“In keeping silent about evil, in burying it so deep within us that no sign of it appears on the surface, we are implanting it, and it will rise up a thousand fold in the future. When we neither punish nor reproach evildoers, we are not simply protecting their trivial old age, we are thereby ripping the foundations of justice from beneath new generations.”

But let us be generous. We will not shoot them. We will not pour salt water into them, nor bury them in bedbugs, nor bridle them up into a "swan dive," nor keep them on sleepless "stand-up" for a week, nor kick them with jackboots, nor beat them with rubber truncheons, nor squeeze their skulls with iron rings, nor push them into a cell so that they lie atop one another like pieces of baggage - we will not do any of the things they did! But for the sake of our country and our children we have the duty to seek them all out and bring them all to trial! Not to put them on trial so much as their crimes. And to compel each one of them to announce loudly:

“All you freedom-loving “left wing” thinkers in the West! You left-laborites! You progressive American, German, and French students! As far as you are concerned, this whole book of mine is a waste of effort. You may suddenly understand it all someday – but only when you yourselves hear ‘hands behind your backs there!’ and step ashore on our Archipelago.”

I'm reading part 1 now, its a great book; Solzhenitsyn is a great writer. I was expecting to be tired of hearing about Gulags after a while, but it has been very interesting to read and just as passionate as the other great Russian writers I love so much.

I've always thought about that. How do you cultivate and spread such culture. You have to have a critical mass of such people.
It seems burgers have some hope in that regard with their 2A and over my dead cold hands. But most of the other so called civilized world - not so much.
It seems also a problem with being "civilized" a comfortable existence with a well known habit of trusting the law and order and the state administering them. A more clannish existence would see people group more to their kin and neighbours .

What other writers would you recommend.

Keked at how he describes the absurdity of this scene. The Soviet Union was a fucking comedy show.

and the doctor will not raise a peep about your arrest — just let him try! They'll take you right off the
operating table — as they took N. M. Vorobyev, a school inspector, in 1936, in the middle of an
operation for stomach ulcer — and drag you off to a cell, as they did him, half-alive and all bloody (as
Karpunich recollects). Or, like Nadya Levitskaya, you try to get information about your mother's
sentence, and they give it to you, but it turns out to be a confrontation — and your own arrest!

In the
Gastronome — the fancy food store — you are invited to the special-order department and arrested
there. You are arrested by a religious pilgrim whom you have put up for the night "for the sake of
Christ." You are arrested by a meterman who has come to read your electric meter. You are arrested
by a bicyclist who has run into you on the street, by a railway conductor, a taxi driver, a savings
bank teller, the manager of a movie theater. Any one of them can arrest you, and you notice the
concealed maroon-colored identification card only when it is too late.

He's quite a thorough author. I don't know why people have to bash this man and reject the obvious hell he wrote about, at least appreciate the book for the quality of writing.

>important, powerful book

It's fiction, just like TGSNT.

Dostoevsky, Tolstoy (my favourite author), Chekhov, Gogol, Bulgakov, Turgenev, Pushkin, Goncharov, Lermontov, Solzhenitsyn's other works - all masterpieces.

Would also recommend, its very similar in style to War and Peace except the only downside is that it felt like it needed more editing, especially near the end. Apparently Life and Fate was smuggled out of the Soviet Union and was published after Grossman died, so he never had the chance to fully edit the book.

Worth reading the unabridged version? Only ever read abridged.

Good thread, OP. The americans here need to know the true horrors of communism seeing how they're so inclined to "try it out again" in their own country these days with the rampant leftism.

> We did not love freedom enough. Every man always has handy a dozen glib little reasons why
Chilling.

Really makes you question not just what cruelty people are capable of but this curse of apathy that turns people in farm animals. I mean it got Socrates killed and hasn't left us still, only one fanatical idea after another giving people the courage to kill each other but to defend freedom? That's really only happened a few times hasn't it?

Oh Brazil you beautiful bastard

>and Hitlers Holocaust actually has documantation behind it

>muh 60 million killed
Kek. I'd love to see you follow this thought through. How many were killed?

Because /leftypol/ is in an endless state of triggering from the book that absolutely humiliated the French Communist Party to a point it never recovered, let alone the effects on other countries.

> suicide is murder
> almost twice as many people killed under communism than homicides in that century
Wew

With all due respect Dad, you are far closer than they are.

I would say so, yes.

If Corbyn and McDonnell get into power, it will fast forward the process dramatically.

eventually they installed a gong that would tell you when it was ok to stop clapping. There is even a video of it.

AYYYYYYYYY

>communism
>popular

Muh 60 mill
Muh holdamor
Muh stalin

Jesus christ Sup Forums is so pathetic

Your commie is showing.

AYYYYYYYYY

Solzhenitsyn's "witness," as Christians call it, is the best argument I've encountered for belief in God

"Liar, you did not get 20 year for doing nothing wrong. For doing nothing, they only give you 5 years"

...

As opposed to the tired, false narrative from our school systems?
>Muh 6 million
>Muh holocaust
>Muh "everyone who even remotely questions is Hortler"

Jesus Christ, Kool-Aid drinkers are so pathetic.

...

Holy shit, OP is right. Commies flock to this thread like flies to shit. Why are they so mad about this book?

>le everyone but me is le commie XDDD

I'm half way through the second book, please tell me it gets better (i know it won't though)

>6m from snakes
Those snaeky little bastards.

The mere mention of this book to a commie makes them froth at the mouth screaming that it's fiction. This book is their Achilles heel, which is why everyone should read it.

I dont need to be a commie to call out a lie

Just started reading it
>sent to GULAG for 10 years for teaching your children your religion
That was a harsh time.

underrated

>le memespeak turns my argument more credible

If you read the book, you'd see it has nothing to do with genocide olympics.

Always wondered why (((Hollywood))) never made a blockbuster movie about the Gulags. What a great movie it would be whilst there are countless about Hitler.

>(((Hollywood)))
are you really wondering?

le le le le le le le XDDDDDD!!!!!

A brief history of communism in Yugoslavia:
>be 1945
>commies win
>3 years pass
>communism fails miserably
>1948
>Tito tells Stalin to GTFO
>moves to the west
>Yugoslavia gets $100 billion dollars and fighter jets
>fast forward 35 years
>gibs run out
>"pay denbts"
>"no"
>get the shit bombed out of you
There you go

Who gave them the money and fighter jets?

Both sides of the Cold War gave them money not to join the other side.

America. Yugo was pampered by the West to stay away from the USSR. Yugo communism was payed for by the USA.

It actually does, Solzy goes through a spiritual awakening towards the end. It's actually pretty heartwarming.
Praise God lads.

You need an answer?

>tfw listen to the 7 part audiobook on youtube
>mfw the last half hour is cut off the last part

You folks have no idea how tough gettin an unabridged copy of volume 3 is

Sadly most commie apologists won't be persuaded by anything. Even if they had no idea of the scope of the crimes committed and would learn more about it my reading the book. Their go to defense remains untouched and it always will.
>not real communism
>communism is perfect, it's the humans who are at fault
>there is no contradiction in calling a system that is supposed to govern humans perfect even though it fails due to human nature which any governing system would need to take into account
>next time it will work out though

Well the Brits made a film of One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch but that's it. I'd LOVE to see a film on the Kengir Uprising. Or better yet, a miniseries.

Bump for good thread.

The soviet population grew every year except during ww2. You should think that the killing of muh 60 million would show up in the demographics.

b-b-but everything except Robert Conquest books, PragerU videos, Paul Bogdanor's website, and the Gulag Archipelago is just communist propaganda!

>commies actually showed up for damage control