The communist government in the former Soviet Union came to power under the banner of equality. What does Shukhov’s imprisonment (and the entire gulag system) say about the fate of the movement? How does life in the gulag represents Soviet society in general?
Even though The Soviet Union came to power under the banner of equality, Shukhov’s imprisonment and the entire gulag system showed that this ideology was not seen in practice because in the prison, there were categories even among people of the same group and this can be seen in Shukhov’s life since he had people above him and also behind him. For instance, in the prison, there were gang-leaders who represented everything for the rest of the prisoners and, depending on how good or bad …show more content…
Members of the gangs forced each other to do the work since the work was counted collectively, and, depending on how the work was done dictated how the camp authorities handed out the food11. Furthermore, life in the gulag represents Soviet society in general because of the labor. In 1940 more than 13 million people worked in forced labor12. In the case of the gangs, it was also the forced labor penalty. The prisoners worked every day and in hard conditions. They were exposed to the cold, working in the camp’s activities, mainly construction. But because the prisoners were not specialists, the work was mediocre13. Even the cooker or the sanitary inspector of the camp did not really realize a good job14. The life in the gulag also represents the Soviet society in the manner that it was about survival; throughout Shukhov’s imprisonment, we can see that most of the time, the prisoners thought about food, and sometimes about finding wood to protect themselves from the cold or going to the infirmary and trying to get hours lying on the bed of the infirmary ‘due to a supposed sickness’. All these acts represent their wishes to survive. However, despite the collectivity of the Soviet society seen in the different activities of the camp commanded by their leaders, when it came to things, such as food or survival, you could see that everyone tried to save himself; an example of this idea is when Ivan pointed out that the Latvian who had been at the camp just a couple of months understood this lesson very quickly, “if you don’t bite, you don’t eat”15, he says. We can also see this struggle to survive in Kuzyyomin’s code where, he says that “there is neither salvation nor punishment in the hereafter; there is only the present struggle against one’s annihilation”16. To continue, life in the gulag represents Soviet society in ordering the
Even though The Soviet Union came to power under the banner of equality, Shukhov’s imprisonment and the entire gulag system showed that this ideology was not seen in practice because in the prison, there were categories even among people of the same group and this can be seen in Shukhov’s life since he had people above him and also behind him. For instance, in the prison, there were gang-leaders who represented everything for the rest of the prisoners and, depending on how good or bad …show more content…
Members of the gangs forced each other to do the work since the work was counted collectively, and, depending on how the work was done dictated how the camp authorities handed out the food11. Furthermore, life in the gulag represents Soviet society in general because of the labor. In 1940 more than 13 million people worked in forced labor12. In the case of the gangs, it was also the forced labor penalty. The prisoners worked every day and in hard conditions. They were exposed to the cold, working in the camp’s activities, mainly construction. But because the prisoners were not specialists, the work was mediocre13. Even the cooker or the sanitary inspector of the camp did not really realize a good job14. The life in the gulag also represents the Soviet society in the manner that it was about survival; throughout Shukhov’s imprisonment, we can see that most of the time, the prisoners thought about food, and sometimes about finding wood to protect themselves from the cold or going to the infirmary and trying to get hours lying on the bed of the infirmary ‘due to a supposed sickness’. All these acts represent their wishes to survive. However, despite the collectivity of the Soviet society seen in the different activities of the camp commanded by their leaders, when it came to things, such as food or survival, you could see that everyone tried to save himself; an example of this idea is when Ivan pointed out that the Latvian who had been at the camp just a couple of months understood this lesson very quickly, “if you don’t bite, you don’t eat”15, he says. We can also see this struggle to survive in Kuzyyomin’s code where, he says that “there is neither salvation nor punishment in the hereafter; there is only the present struggle against one’s annihilation”16. To continue, life in the gulag represents Soviet society in ordering the