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Authors: Vasily Grossman
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Shlyapin’s death remains unclear, which is no doubt why Grossman wanted to include him in The People Immortal . On 4 October, Grossman and his companions found themselves far from alone in their determination to escape.
I thought I’d seen retreat, but I’ve never seen anything like what I am seeing now, and could never even imagine anything of the kind. Exodus! Biblical exodus! Vehicles are moving in eight lanes, there’s the violent roaring of dozens of trucks trying simultaneously to tear their wheels out of the mud. Huge herds of sheep and cows are driven through the fields. They are followed by trains of horse-driven carts, there are thousands of wagons covered with coloured sackcloth, veneer, tin. In them are refugees from Ukraine. There are also crowds of pedestrians with sacks, bundles, suitcases.
This isn’t a flood, this isn’t a river, it’s the slow movement of a flowing ocean, this flow is hundreds of metres wide. Children’s heads, fair and dark, are looking out from under the improvised tents covering the carts, as well as the biblical beards of Jewish elders, shawls of peasant women, hats of Ukrainian uncles, and the black-haired heads of Jewish girls and women. What silence is in their eyes, what wise sorrow, what sensation of fate, of a universal catastrophe!
In the evening, the sun comes out from the multilayered blue, black and grey clouds. Its rays are wide, stretching from the sky down to the ground, as in Doré’s paintings depicting those frightening biblical scenes when celestial forces strike the Earth. This movement of elders, of women carrying babies in their arms, of herds of sheep and of warriors seems in these broad yellow sunrays so majestic and so tragic. There are moments when I feel with complete vividness as if we have been transported back in time to the era of biblical catastrophes.
Everyone keeps looking up into the sky, but not because they are waiting for the Messiah. They are watching out for German bombers. Suddenly there are shouts: ‘Here they are! They’re coming, they are coming straight for us!’
Dozens of aerial boats are gliding in the sky, slowly and smoothly, in triangular ranks. They are moving towards us. Dozens, hundreds of people climb over the sides of trucks, jump out of cabins, run towards the forest. Everyone is infected with panic, the running crowd is growing bigger every minute. And then everyone hears theshrill voice of a woman: ‘Cowards, cowards, they are just cranes flying over!’ Confusion.
Staying the night in Komarichi. Some of the staff have arrived. The colonel advises us not to go to sleep and to visit him every hour. He himself knows absolutely nothing, he has no means of communication, and with whom, anyway, would he communicate? Troyanovsky had said he would keep visiting the colonel, but suddenly he disappears, we are furious, then alarmed: the lad has disappeared, and there’s no sign of him. Lysov and I take turns to go and see the colonel, and in the pauses we keep looking out of the window and develop dozens of theories for Troyanovsky’s disappearance. I go out into the yard and suddenly hear some muffled noises coming from our Emka automobile. I open the door. Our missing youth is there enjoying the company of our landlady’s niece. I embarrassed them and they embarrassed me. I removed Troyanovsky from the car and he received a severe reprimand from us in the house. ‘Do you realise what sort of situation we are all in, you young fool, how dare you!’
Yes, he understands everything and agrees with everything. He is very sorry. There’s a sweet, pacified expression in his face. He is yawning, stretching. This is probably what makes us so angry. We haven’t had even half as good a time as he has. The niece comes back to the izba . Oh, there’s calmness and peace in her face. One could paint [pictures entitled] ‘Innocence’, ‘Purity’, ‘Morning’. This makes us furious. We have to move on again at dawn.
The
I thought I’d seen retreat, but I’ve never seen anything like what I am seeing now, and could never even imagine anything of the kind. Exodus! Biblical exodus! Vehicles are moving in eight lanes, there’s the violent roaring of dozens of trucks trying simultaneously to tear their wheels out of the mud. Huge herds of sheep and cows are driven through the fields. They are followed by trains of horse-driven carts, there are thousands of wagons covered with coloured sackcloth, veneer, tin. In them are refugees from Ukraine. There are also crowds of pedestrians with sacks, bundles, suitcases.
This isn’t a flood, this isn’t a river, it’s the slow movement of a flowing ocean, this flow is hundreds of metres wide. Children’s heads, fair and dark, are looking out from under the improvised tents covering the carts, as well as the biblical beards of Jewish elders, shawls of peasant women, hats of Ukrainian uncles, and the black-haired heads of Jewish girls and women. What silence is in their eyes, what wise sorrow, what sensation of fate, of a universal catastrophe!
In the evening, the sun comes out from the multilayered blue, black and grey clouds. Its rays are wide, stretching from the sky down to the ground, as in Doré’s paintings depicting those frightening biblical scenes when celestial forces strike the Earth. This movement of elders, of women carrying babies in their arms, of herds of sheep and of warriors seems in these broad yellow sunrays so majestic and so tragic. There are moments when I feel with complete vividness as if we have been transported back in time to the era of biblical catastrophes.
Everyone keeps looking up into the sky, but not because they are waiting for the Messiah. They are watching out for German bombers. Suddenly there are shouts: ‘Here they are! They’re coming, they are coming straight for us!’
Dozens of aerial boats are gliding in the sky, slowly and smoothly, in triangular ranks. They are moving towards us. Dozens, hundreds of people climb over the sides of trucks, jump out of cabins, run towards the forest. Everyone is infected with panic, the running crowd is growing bigger every minute. And then everyone hears theshrill voice of a woman: ‘Cowards, cowards, they are just cranes flying over!’ Confusion.
Staying the night in Komarichi. Some of the staff have arrived. The colonel advises us not to go to sleep and to visit him every hour. He himself knows absolutely nothing, he has no means of communication, and with whom, anyway, would he communicate? Troyanovsky had said he would keep visiting the colonel, but suddenly he disappears, we are furious, then alarmed: the lad has disappeared, and there’s no sign of him. Lysov and I take turns to go and see the colonel, and in the pauses we keep looking out of the window and develop dozens of theories for Troyanovsky’s disappearance. I go out into the yard and suddenly hear some muffled noises coming from our Emka automobile. I open the door. Our missing youth is there enjoying the company of our landlady’s niece. I embarrassed them and they embarrassed me. I removed Troyanovsky from the car and he received a severe reprimand from us in the house. ‘Do you realise what sort of situation we are all in, you young fool, how dare you!’
Yes, he understands everything and agrees with everything. He is very sorry. There’s a sweet, pacified expression in his face. He is yawning, stretching. This is probably what makes us so angry. We haven’t had even half as good a time as he has. The niece comes back to the izba . Oh, there’s calmness and peace in her face. One could paint [pictures entitled] ‘Innocence’, ‘Purity’, ‘Morning’. This makes us furious. We have to move on again at dawn.
The
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