Description

8vo, hardcover in dj, pp. 395. If Vasily Grossmanís 1961 masterpiece, Life and Fate, had been published during his lifetime, it would have reached the world together with Pasternakís Doctor Zhivago and before Solzhenitsynís Gulag. But Life and Fate was seized by the KGB. When it emerged posthumously, decades later, it was recognized as the War and Peace of the twentieth century. Always at the epicenter of events, Grossman (1905ñ1964) was among the first to describe the Holocaust and the Ukrainian famine. His 1944 article ìThe Hell of Treblinkaî became evidence at Nuremberg. Grossmanís powerful anti-totalitarian works liken the Nazisí crimes against humanity with those of Stalin. His compassionate prose has the everlasting quality of great art. Because Grossmanís major works appeared after much delay we are only now able to examine them properly. Alexandra Popoffís authoritative biography illuminates Grossmanís life and legacy.