Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago: An Experiment in Literary Investigation changed the course of the 20th century. It became very difficult to retain an attachment to Soviet Communism and even Marxism after its publication in France. Now in its 50th anniversary of the English publication, Solzhenitsyn’s searing and deep indictment of the Communist project has lost none of its power.

A defiant testimony to truth written in the very center of the Lie, Solzhenitsyn deftly sketches the particular evil of Communist tyranny in its manifold aspects. It belongs to no one genre, being by turns historical, philosophical, autobiographical, political, and even theological. Its eloquence, wisdom, moral clarity, and urgency ensure it a place on the shelf of enduring works never to be forgotten.

Image: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn writing at his homemade table in Vermont, circa 1985.

 

The Gulag Archipelago with Flagg Taylor

Faculty

Flagg Taylor

Flagg Taylor is an Associate Professor of Government at Skidmore College, and serves on the Academic Council of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation. He is editor most recently of The Long Night of the Watchman: Essays by Václav Benda, 1977–1989. He is currently writing a book on Czech dissent in the 1970s and 1980s and hosts The Enduring Interest podcast.

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