Journey into the Whirlwind Quotes

“By way of farewell, I recited Mandelshtam’s † melancholy poem: The horses tread slowly,
The lamps burn low,
And where they are taking me
Only strangers know.”
― Evgenia Ginzburg, Journey into the Whirlwind: The Critically Acclaimed Memoir of Stalin's Reign of Terror

“When the NKVD came in the middle of the night to arrest her husband, who had spent Sunday with her in Kazan, she carried on in a manner worthy of a Greek tragedy. Needless to say, she was heartbroken for her beloved husband, the father of her child, but she suppressed her feelings. “So he lied to me,” she exclaimed dramatically. “So he really was against the Party all the time!” With an amused grin, the men from the NKVD said: “Better get his things together.” But she refused to do this for an enemy of the Party, and when her husband went to his sleeping child’s cot to kiss him good-by, she barred his way: “My child has no father!” Then, shaking the policemen fervently by the hand, she swore to them that her son would be brought up a loyal servant of the Party.”
― Eugenia Ginzburg, Journey into the Whirlwind

“… but Pravda said so, and it must therefore be true…”
― Eugenia Ginzburg, Journey into the Whirlwind

“Let us give thanks to our father, leader, and creator for our happy lives!” “Stankovskaya, to hear your anti-Soviet talk, one can hardly believe that you were a member of a municipal committee!” “Yes, and to hear you people one can hardly believe that you’re not on the prison staff. Why don’t you call the guards now and report this conversation? You might get some clean underwear as a reward, and then you wouldn’t stink so much.”
― Evgenia Ginzburg, Journey into the Whirlwind: The Critically Acclaimed Memoir of Stalin's Reign of Terror

“From that moment, events rushed on with breath-taking speed. I spent the two and a half months until my arrest in tormented conflict between reason and the kind of foreboding which Lermontov called “prophetic anguish.”
― Evgenia Ginzburg, Journey into the Whirlwind: The Critically Acclaimed Memoir of Stalin's Reign of Terror