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36th out of 115 books
—
96 voters
Sofia Petrovna
Sofia Petrovna is Lydia Chukovskaya's fictional account of the Great Purge. Her eponymous heroine is a Soviet Everywoman, a doctor's widow who works as a typist in a Leningrad publishing house.
Paperback, 120 pages
Published
June 8th 1994
by Northwestern University Press
(first published 1967)
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USSR. 1937. Enemy of the people. These short words might as well be - and often were - a death sentence. For you. For your friends. For your family. For anyone connected with you. For millions and millions of the Soviet people that have perished in the Great Purges, courtesy of the terror state run by paranoid and fanatical Comrade Stalin (*)
(*) Little-known fact: "Joseph Stalin, the Secretary General of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (1922-1953), was nominated for the Nobel Peace Priz...more
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Kafka's "The Trial" is almost an allegory, if an unusually powerful one. "Sofia Petrovna", by the Russian writer Lydia Chukovskaya, gives the Kafka story flesh. Sofia Petrovna is cursed by being the mother of an exceptional but conventionally Marxist son and a friend and fellow-typist in a publishing house who has the misfortune of being born to a disgraced middle-class. It is a world in which apparatchiks run publishing houses, where evidence of skill is the mark of being insufficiently proleta...more
Gives you a real vision of what life would be like in a nonsensical dictatorial society where reason and justice are thrown out the window. Cause and effect do not apply. This is apparently the only book about the Great Purge or Great Terror that was written while it was still in progress.
**Spoiler** For the sake of her sanity, Sofia Petrovna doubts everything, including her best friends and family, for the sake of preserving her trust in the societal and governmental system, because if she dou...more
**Spoiler** For the sake of her sanity, Sofia Petrovna doubts everything, including her best friends and family, for the sake of preserving her trust in the societal and governmental system, because if she dou...more
This book shows the awful realities of Stalin's Great Purge. There are essentially two perspectives you can take in portraying the struggles of the people that were a part of this purge. One aspect is from the people that were exiled and the other is from the wives and mothers that watched their innocent husbands and sons be exiled. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch shows the former while Sofia Petrovna shows the latter. Both are vital in truly understanding the Great Purge and what happen...more
Sofia Petrovna is a touching novel with its stark tragedies and complexities. The frank tone in which Sofia Petrovna accepts and denies the circumstances within her life brings to life the reality of the Russian mindset during the purges of Stalin. Although the author has repeatedly stated that she does not understand the aesthetics of her piece, only that it portrays the honesty of that period in time, it nevertheless holds the caliber of a written masterpiece.
The reader is bound to feel for th...more
The reader is bound to feel for th...more
I'm currently reading all the most significant Russian literature and Sofia Petrovna is the most easiest to read. In a word, it's sad. The book is very honest and considered to be courageous thus, it was a book meant for the drawer. Not till the 60's I believe, it was released. The book paralleled between theagonizing angst due to the absence of Chukovskaya's husband and her main character, Sofia Petrovna's absence of her son. There were a lot of similiarities and was an accurate portrayal purge...more
A good book, but not a great book. At times it verges into the conventional or the melodramatic, but as one of the few novels about the Great Purge written during the period it's an important cultural document.
Also worth reading is the afterword, extracted from Chukovskaya's memoir The Process of Expulsion when Sofia Petrovna was only available via Samizdat in her home country, that describes how the book almost saw print during the Khrushchev Thaw.
Also worth reading is the afterword, extracted from Chukovskaya's memoir The Process of Expulsion when Sofia Petrovna was only available via Samizdat in her home country, that describes how the book almost saw print during the Khrushchev Thaw.
I enjoyed this slim book for its spare and unadorned prose. It's about the Great Purge in Russia in 1938 and follows the life of an everyday woman named Sofia Petrovna, who works in an office as head typist. Petrovna at first cannot understand what's going on around her, especially when her son suddenly gets arrested. Ultimately, she falls into despair, loneliness and madness.
It's a moving account of Soviet life during the Stalinist era, but what I liked most was that it was written from a woman...more
It's a moving account of Soviet life during the Stalinist era, but what I liked most was that it was written from a woman...more
This book contained a sentence that I still, years after reading it, haven't been able to get out of my head. It's right before her son leaves, and she says, "For a long time his departure was a week away, and then suddenly it was tomorrow." That's always how time works, isn't it?
And then, such a heart-rendingly sad book about such horrrific tragedy.
And then, such a heart-rendingly sad book about such horrrific tragedy.
I don't want to give this book a very high rating because it was so disgustingly depressing, but it certainly was a good book. I was captivated throughout the story. Reading it can really help put things in perspective for people in the western world who can't understand why 'they' "just let it happen."
But it's seriously incredibly depressing.
But it's seriously incredibly depressing.
When Sofia's son is detained by the NKVD in late 1930s Leningrad she goes from career woman to one who waits: it may be about Stalin's Soviet Union but could just as easily be about those who wait in Argentina, or for news from Guantanamo Bay, or countless others whose loved one's are victims of absurd, irrational systems of control. Elegant, exceptional.
Aug 07, 2011
Nate
added it
read it for my russian history class, gives a great insight into the great purges and what made them possible
An excellent, deeply moving story about an ordinary family caught up in the terror of Stalinism.
For some reason I don't usually cry at Russian literature ... you won't find me weeping over a Chekhov story, not matter how tragic.
However, this account of the USSR in Stalin's time changed all that.
However, this account of the USSR in Stalin's time changed all that.
A great story about things of the past that could still happen. A must read.
Painfully real Soviet realism.
short, painful, powerful.
a fascinating rendering of the effect of Stalin’s Great Purge on one woman, written at the time by an author who similarly suffered. A decent read and a fascinating historical document. Well worth your time.
Bleak and depressing novella of Stalinist times.
I did not realize this was the very same story as The Deserted House. Halfway through this book, it started sounding familiar and then I went to my shelves to retrieve my college copy of The Deserted House. The first sentences are identical except for the name change. It's Sofia Petrovna in one and Olga Petrovna in the other.
I did not realize this was the very same story as The Deserted House. Halfway through this book, it started sounding familiar and then I went to my shelves to retrieve my college copy of The Deserted House. The first sentences are identical except for the name change. It's Sofia Petrovna in one and Olga Petrovna in the other.
This is the most terrifying horror story I've read since Jackson's "The Lottery".
This is a great book about the nature of Stalin's "great terror" and his purges of the late 40's and 50's. I definitely reccomend it to anyone who's interested in Soviet history or how people can be terrorized and deceived by propoganda.
A sad, beautiful story about life during the Soviet Purges. More people need to read stuff like this to understand what REALLY went on over in Russia during the Cold War.
Another cheery Soviet novel, this one more of a window into life in the 1930's. This novel absoloutley guts you, but is a good read.
Oct 21, 2008
Julia
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
Historical Fiction Fans
Recommended to Julia by:
My husband the with the Russian Minor.
Good insight to what was happening during the rise of communism in Russia.
Such a great quick read. Thoroughly enjoyed. Definitely recommend!
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Lydia Chukovskaya wrote 'Sofia Petrovna', a harrowing story about life during the Great Purges. But it was a while before this story would achieve widespread recognition. Out of favour with the authorities, yet principled and uncompromising, Chukovskaya was unable to hold down any kind of steady employment. But gradually, she started to get published again: an introduction to the works of Taras Sh...more
More about Lydia Chukovskaya...
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