The selection of journalist Svetlana Alexievich as the recipient of the 2015 Nobel prize for Literature shows that the Swedish academy has garnered enough courage to think, and act, in unconventional ways.
I have read two of her books and those who are involved in creative writing would only have respect for her works. I have read ‘Voices of Chernobyl,’ a book on the Chernobyl disaster, and ‘Zinky Boys,’ which tells the plight of Russian soldiers who had to beat an unceremonious retreat after Russia’s rout in Afghanistan.
The disaster in Chernobyl was trivialised and even suppressed by Russian officials even though about three fourths of Europe had to bear the effects of the radiation leak. While studies about the incident were not very forthcoming, those who experienced the disaster were not even ready to remember the night of the incident. The author collated information from those who survived and gave a painstaking account of the accident.
Eight years of serious rummaging through facts led to the book. When the book was finally published it was met with stiff resistance from those in power, but they could not deter the journalist in Svetlana. She had collected details from those who experienced the disaster first hand. While many took years to speak out, Svetlana tried to talk for them by explaining their plight in her book through soliloquies.
In the end of the book, Svetlana talks about Misha, who survived the disaster. When the incident occurred, it was Misha's birthday and her husband had chose to go for work. He never came back and Misha does not want to remind herself about her life after the incident. Her son became a mental wreck and when she goes to meet him in hospital, he asks for his father. The five-year old mind trapped in the young man’s body in still waiting for his father to return. Svetlana asks, “Will another incident like this happen again? We are still in Stalin's world, we are still Stalin's subjects.”
‘Zinky Boys’ talks about the plight of the Russian forces in Afghanistan where they fought a failing war. In the book, Svetlana describes how the steady flow of returning bodies of Russian soldiers in Zinc coffins bruised the hearts of mothers in Russia. Here too authorities tried to hide the disaster from public memory and perception to such an extent that mothers were not allowed to properly see the cold faces of their sons in Zinc coffins for the last time.
Svetlana's investigative research and lucid description creates a fulfilling journey into the event she is describing in her books. The two books would coerce people to think hard because such events can happen anywhere in the world. She affirms that the iron curtain of power cannot browbeat truth for long. Her words reek of stench from burnt human bodies.
Disclaimer
The comments posted here/below/in the given space are not on behalf of Manorama. The person posting the comment will be in sole ownership of its responsibility. According to the central government's IT rules, obscene or offensive statement made against a person, religion, community or nation is a punishable offense, and legal action would be taken against people who indulge in such activities.