Alexandr SOLZHENITZIN (Rest In Peace) is not among us any more!
What do you think about him and his legacy these days?
2008-08-10T04:12:10Z
3 emotional, exciting answers so far! This makes me keep the question still open for a while.
reader: "His work will certainly live on long beyond him" - I'm deeply convinced about it!
THE nerd: About his relationships with Putin - I find it strange too, but the Russian Soul has always been difficult to understand, maybe only Great Souls can forgive without hatred. Or maybe the reason is Solzhenitzin's wish the Russia to be a bastion of the Orthodox Christianity and a great World Power. He has 3 sons indeed.
reader2008-08-06T21:03:10Z
Favorite Answer
I think the same thing these days as I have always thought. I think he was a courageous and brilliant man. I think that the world is very fortunate that he survived his travails and was capable of elucidating them in a broad and insightful way so that the rest of us could learn from his experiences and his analysis of them. I regret his passing but I am glad that he had the opportunity to live for many years peacefully. His work will certainly live on long beyond him, and I doubt he would have wished for more. Still, I mourn him.
Great answers, all. And yes, we Russians--well, I'm only part-- are complex and mysterious. But Einstein was right--the mysterious is beautiful :)
He was such an inspiration. He opened peoples' eyes to so many critical issues, and he's way up on my list of favourite Russians, alongside Dostoevsky. He, coupled with a few other brilliant minds, was instrumental in my campaign against prescribed thought, and really inspires people to be curious and live a life based in curious self-awareness.
It was interesting that Putin seemed so friendly with a man who was haunted by the secret police, since he started his career with the KGB; but I read that he and Putin had grown closer? Strange.
Anyway, he lived a long, full life, had a wife and three (I think?) sons, and won a Nobel...what more could you want from life? :) May he rest in peace.
Oh wow, I missed that he passed away over the weekend!
I can't say much really, my mother read his work, but I can't say I did. However, I do remember that I learned about the Gulag and what it was by listening to her talk about the book to my dad when I was a child (in the 1970s). That's also how I found out who he was (plus seeing his books in the house. I was young and I was not into truly deep material back then.