One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Alexander Solzhenitsyn

As for the Russians, they'd forgotten which hand to cross themselves with.

How can you expect a man who's warm to understand a man who's cold?

Oh, you musn't pray for that either, said Alyosha, horrified. Why do you want freedom? In freedom your last grain of faith will be choked with weeds. You should rejoice that you're in prison. Here you have time to think about your soul. As the Apostle Paul wrote: 'Why all these tears? Why are you trying to weaken my resolution? For my part I am ready not merely to be bound but even to die for the name of the Lord Jesus."

Solzhenitsyn deserves credit for many things, not least among them is his ability to weave a compelling, easily-read story without a traditional storyline. In school they teach you Exposition, Rising Action, Turning Point, Climax, Denouement, but Solzhenitsyn manages to circumvent this infectious storyline with Ivan Denisovich. I always admire stories that manage not to rely on gripping climaxes, directed outcomes, and delicately balanced actions. Although all these things often occur in life, we rarely are gifted enough to glimpse how they attain their equilibrium; we rarely find as much meaning in life as we find in stories. Which might be the purpose of stories. But the best stories are those that have a few bits that are meaningful not because they further the plot, develop the character, foreshadow the end, or explicate the depth, but because they are real. Some very strange things really happen. So do many normal things. Two loons might even sit on a lake and call to one another. And a man might even witness that. So the trick is not to write a meaningful story with normal things; the trick is not to write a normal story with meaningful things; the trick is not to write a story so meaningful it ceases to be normal, nor so normal it ceases to be meaningful; the trick is not even to write a story that recognizes the meaning in normal things--no, the trick is to write a story that is content with the meaning of normal things.