Remember, Frazier traveled six thousand miles the first time, not understanding the language(s), with two guides he could barely speak to, who could not figure out why the hell this weird American who occasionally called home for money was on this trip and wanted to see prisons; gulags.
Now Frazier is back several years later, with Sergio as his comrade and guide, to travel Siberia in the winter, and with his semi hidden agenda of visiting a prison. When the opportunity arises, Sergio wades through the thigh deep snow with him to visit a prison camp that built the road they are on, during Stalin's reign.
Frazier does not go in, but looks through windows and wanders about. Sergio does go in. Eventually Sergio urges his back to the bus, telling him the other passengers are waiting. And then, several pages of Frazier's compelling prose, that has kept me reading.
Why don't we despise Stalin as we despise Hitler? Stalin killed more people than Hitler dreamed of. Why don't Russians despise Stalin. Why do they embrace the disintegrating highways to nowhere, empty towns and cities, airports, built by slave labor of the gulags, for the glory of Stalin?
Which brings me to the other book I'm listening to, Al Roker's Ruthless Tide, the story of the Johnstown flood. I've read other accounts of this horrible tragedy, and am very familiar with exactly how the atmosphere conspired to pour an epic flood on to a failing dam.
I'm at the point in Roker's narrative where the dam will fail momentarily. I put down my shuttle, erased the book from my player and came to find a more pleasant end to my day.
The deep rose is woven and finished, but I don't have the blue around the beam yet. It will be tomorrow before I can take off the deep rose and begin turning it into towels. The blue is called denim, and it's nice against the cream of the warp.
Hari OM
ReplyDeleteIt's good to read educational and biographical tomes... but it's also good to know when to stop! YAM xx
I like that denim colour and look forward to seeing it as towels.
ReplyDeleteHumanity does seem to produce incredibly cruel and powerful people more often than seems possible. And the damn thing is- we keep letting them get away with their evil. We see it happening now.
ReplyDeleteWell.
That denim color is going to be glorious. I love it.
It is a strange thing that Stalin gets a pass. Or is it?
ReplyDeleteDidn't realize Stalin had killed more than Hitler. Interesting how he is perceived over Hitler. Book does sound very fascinating! Love the color of denim!
ReplyDeletebetty
I hadn't realized that Al Roker was an author. May the book continue to hold your attention.
ReplyDeleteI like the denim color as well.
I thought it would be interesting, the meteorological side of it. But he is concentrating on the human tole, and I can't take the description again. I got it the first time.
DeleteStalin was brutal to any dissenter or foe. Just guessing but I wonder if he was a type of war hero for successfully pushing the Nazi back into Germany and winning the war for the Russians. People being treated badly does seem to occur throughout history.
ReplyDeleteI have always got at least two books 'on the go' at any one time. And if one is emotionally or brain challenging the second is a piece of agreable trash.
ReplyDeleteLove the denim colour and am clueless about why some ruthless dictators are revered. Stalin of course didn't 'lose' a war.
Hubby and I were watching a documentary last night on the U-Boats of Germany and WWII. I commented that seeing all of those men in their uniforms and medals posturing and glad-handing one another made me so angry. It's like little boys playing in a sandbox--but it's people's LIVES they're taking, and they're proud of it. I have wondered so many times why men must seek to rule and kill others -- to conquer rather than be at peace with their fellow man. My husband just shook his head and said he didn't know. And I too love that blue yarn/thread, but then blue is my favorite color! Sorry to be on the soapbox about history. So brutal...
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you've been enjoying Travels in Siberia. That sure is a big book but then Russia sure is a big country. Since you are familiar with the Johnstown flood I don't blame you for stopping the book before the tragedy. There is no need in doing that to yourself.
ReplyDeleteYou are making great progress with your weaving! You sure do beautiful work!
Ian Frazier is a tiger for punishment, doing the Russian journey TWICE. Pleased you found a map, they give an idea of scale and place.
ReplyDeleteStalin was a terrorist, not in the sense of today's meaning. He terrified the people in his country, any one who did not obey him was dead or as good as dead.
And why would anyone outside Russia care? It's a human trait not to care what happens to others as long as it's not happening to me.
Look at Pol Pot in Cambodia and Mao Zedong in China. Millions of people died.
Grumpy Alphie
Actually, he traveled in Siberia several times, scoping out what lay across from Alaska.Now, in the last chapter, he's planning another trip. He freely admits to being addicted to Siberia.
DeleteI guess it depends where you are, if you have known Stalin's crimes or not. My great grandfather was killed in one of the gulags. His crime? He was a farmer, had a cow (ONE cow) and that was such a horrible offence that he was sent to Siberia.
ReplyDeleteHis family (daughters, my grandma and her sister) got his death certificate in '90s, but no-one knows where he died or where he was buried - not even the cause of death is known. And he was only one in millions...
My children know his story, he will not be forgotten yet.
I am going to order that book today.
ReplyDeleteYou cannot look at Stalin without looking at Lenin first. Lenin created all the bad and handed the baton on to Stalin, even if he warned that Stalin was dangerous and was not his first choice. Lenin is also a hero and for what reason I cannot see. Read his life too.
ReplyDeleteAnd before Lenin the Decemberists and before the Decemberists...
DeleteI've always believed the land forms the people. Russia/Siberia simply is to large and cruel a land.
However, they now have the oil and gas and gas stations on the New Jersey turnpike.
Interesting new world.
Yes, the history trail is important and it has to be understood to understand Stalin.
DeleteYou can only read so much tragedy! Time for something light perhaps.
ReplyDeleteI agree -- Stalin was as murderous a dictator as Hitler and should be equally condemned.
ReplyDeleteHow easy it seems for the cruel to take over and cause such turmoil and grief. History keeps repeating itself and lessons are never learned.
ReplyDeleteI've reached a point where I'm uninterested in reading about tragedy. I tend to get too deeply into what I read. One reason I've quit my book club.
ReplyDeletehuman being are cruel and lust for power. that's all there is to it. what other creature treats it's fellow creatures like we do...torture, imprisonment in horrid conditions, murder. what other creature kills for killing's sake.
ReplyDeleteStalin gets a free pass as do other terrible atrocities like the holocaust in Ireland - called the famine - a deliberate starvation of millions of my people. And then the extermination of native peoples everywhere. Not to mention slavery.
ReplyDeleteEnough depressive stuff. I love that denim colour. I am awfully fond of it with cream. I must work on a blanket.
XO
WWW
Kudos to you, Joanne, for reading Travels in Siberia... too heavy a subject for me these days. I try to keep it light... (need something to balance out the disastrous politics going on).
ReplyDeleteAnd I think I love that denim towel color!
That is a nice clear and pretty blue.
ReplyDeleteGoogle Ian Johnson, author for help with your question.
The books I read are lighter - there's too much crap going on in real life. I need some refuge from the politics and crazy stuff. I do try to educate myself on previous as well as current "crazy stuff" in the world, but not in big doses such as I would get in a non-fiction book. I prefer novels and internet articles instead.
ReplyDeleteThat's a nice shade of blue; can't wait to see it cut with cream.
My grandfather was a prisoner of war in Siberia. It was bad, but he amazingly survived. He was a zen priest and extremely weak when he made it home after the war.
ReplyDeleteI knew Stalin was bad, but I didn’t know how bad. There’s so much of history we don’t know.f
I didn't know Roker wrote a book on that. I've read McCullough's book on the flood.
ReplyDelete