The English translation of this book has been made a finalist of PEN America translation prize and deservedly so. The author is currently at the front fighting Russian full scale invasion. He has volunteered as a simple soldier. The book does not only tell what happens in the camps on the Russian controlled territories and what in store for the people if more would fall in Russian hands. It also shows what happens insight a human being subject to such a torturous environment on a philosophical level. It has to be read widely.
The original review:
I am sitting here, in a spacious room with aroma of coffee and a grass after rain, with the window open into a green summer day, trying to write about something which i know I would not be able to comprehend; knowing that on this green summer day somewhere else the horrors described in this book are still taken place; knowing how pathetic would be anything i can say; knowing that for the young man who wrote the book this exact moment might be the moment when
鈥淵ou do not know when this thought will get into you, grabs your neck and put you head down into hopelessness: it could be a bath, a market, a metro. Any small thing can get you out of yourself and connect a moment of tiredness with what you鈥檝e been through. And then everything is simple: like touching a rosary beads you go through possible options how to leave this world.
If one tries to speak poetically, such minutes remind a summer garden in which suddenly all the birds fall completely quiet, the world around becomes completely silent and you are left absolutely alone.鈥�
It is almost meaningless to try to write about this book. It will be soon available in translation. It will be called: 鈥淭he Torture Camp on Paradise Street鈥�.
Here is the link to a fragment:
And I hope everyone would read it when it is available in full.
But I鈥檝e read the whole book already twice. And I鈥檝e read the last essay many more times. And I keep thinking about it. So I write these words, maybe just for my own sake. I do not know. But I feel I need to do it.
Aseyev, in his not full 30 years, is a great writer. But he also a philosopher. Maybe that is the reason why in his writing he is not only telling individual episodes and the stories. He also tries to contemplate why and how such a place could exist and function.
What torture does to people. So happened that I鈥檝e read recently read Amery"s also:
鈥淲hoever has succumbed to torture can no longer feel at home in the world. The shame of destruction cannot be erased. Trust in the world, which already collapsed in part at the first blow, but in the end, under torture, fully, will not be regained. That one鈥檚 fellow man was experienced as the anti man remains in the tortured person as accumulated horror. It blocks the view into the world in which the principle of hope rules. One who was martyred is a defenceless prisoner of fear. It is fear that henceforth reigns over him. Fear - and also what is called the resentments. They remain and have scarcely a chance to concentrate into a seething purifying thirst for revenge. 鈥�
Aseyev, he was also thinking of revenge.
鈥淚 talked to many prisoners and the majority agreed that if they would have a chance of revenge, they would not hesitate a single second. You see yourself in the faces of those people in balaclavas, in your understanding that in the moment of torture or simply their laughter, you are ready to do even more cruel things to them. It so happened that every new day of torture and humiliation was a stimulus to survive the next one.鈥�
But that was exactly the reason why he thought it is was not a good idea to succumb to revenge at the end. 鈥淣ot the higher moral grounds, or God or the law, but the risk that glance (that ability to see this reflection) would disappear.鈥�
What helped him to survive is occasional ability to write even if not to keep his writing. All the stuff he has written in the captivity was confiscated before he was exchanged. What also helped, and maybe even more, was the thoughts about death. He was constantly coming back to the idea that they could totally dehumanise him, deprive him of everything. But they could not take away his last right - the right to die. 鈥淭he readiness to die was depriving me off its real necessity and brought me some peace of mind.鈥� It was deeper than a suicide as even that was not an option. They were under the constant monitoring. But that existence of death he found comforting.
He notes that the more intellectual, creative the person is the harder it is to deal with the camp. Amery as well talked about it. And probably for those people it is the hardest to adjust to life after the physical captivity is over.
I think I was emotionally ready as much as one could be to read about the time inside this camp. But I do not think I was prepared to read about what happened when Aseyev found himself free again. That is why I鈥檝e read this last essay 鈥淲hite nights鈥� so many times. He wrote it in Prague when he was participating in some conference on human rights. It took place not long after he was released. And it is a stunning piece. Each sentence is more than a scream, is more than an utterance, a raw emotion or more than a pensive reflection. It is something above the words delivered with language in the absence of the other medium. Each sentence contains so much one can read one sentence a day and think about it for a whole that day.
When someone says something like 鈥渢he captivity does not end with the physical release鈥� I think we all would find those words almost a truism. But can we really appreciate what it means? No we cannot. I just leave a passage from this essay here:
鈥渨e should understand that life is not simply unjust - it is possible the situation is much worse. It is possible there is nobody out there to even address this question of justice and we are dealing with the raw facts without any hope of meaning. Yes, one day you are used to live in the frames of the set meanings well understood by the majority: your house, your family, your job. Then suddenly, one day you find yourself in a basement, naked with the wires of electric current attached to different places of your body. This is something one cannot really generalise about, there is no theory that would explain why this is so. Especially, what torments you is this hardly noticeable word 鈥渟uddenly鈥�. What does it mean?
40 years of your life did not give you any experience to answer this because they was no this day in these 40 years. You do not have neither your house nor your job, your closed ones are trying to leave your city not be at the same situation as you are鈥� A few years pass by like that. And then - a bright light - the freedom. This is the situation that might be in some respects more difficult than yesterday鈥檚 basement. A human being who went through this is totally undervalued in time. He does not understand the past, but also the present - the one which he has been already deprived once and deprived in one day. So what? To start everything from the beginning again? What for? Especially if no-one could possibly imagine what you鈥檝e gone through.鈥�
It is not only the text. Aseyev has written something which would help to narrow this unbridgeable gap at least a little bit. He tells how not 鈥渢o help鈥�, not to make more harm by some awkward well-meant nonsense. It is not useful to say to those people 鈥渨e understand鈥�. It humiliates them. It is not good to compare. It makes their individual experience less valuable in their eyes. It is not good to recommend to see something or other 鈥榠n a positive light鈥� or propose some other cliche. According to Aseyev, it is more helpful to agree with them and accept their extremely pessimistic view. Give them time to be.
I have to admit I鈥檝e never thought about such things properly before but this book helped me to see the destiny of Celan, Amerry and others. It indeed helped me to see many things in the light I鈥檝e never contemplated.
Also and, somewhat more unexpectedly, it helped me understand why some people would want to return the soviet union or the other form of empire. When they 鈥渃ame out鈥� they as well faced a 鈥渂right light鈥� of freedom they could not bear. Some of them have moved on if only through a huge trauma. But some others just want to come back to their atrocious captivity where their fear is not the fear of absurd and unknown meaningless. Their fear is regulated by some sort of authority and they do not need to deal with their own selves.
ps The initial thought @29/06/2022: I did not think I would have to read the thoughts of a survivor of a concentration camp in 2022. And the camp would be in the middle of Europe; and the time of the survivor's release would be 2019. But here I am. And I cannot say how I am grateful that he found the strength to put it all on paper. I cannot write what I feel just yet as it is too raw. The sentence I cannot get out of my mind at the moment:
"One has to learn how to be free in the same way one has to learn how to love".
The English translation of this book has been made a finalist of PEN America translation prize. The author himself is currently at the front fighting Russian full scale invasion. He has volunteered as a simple soldier.
Original:
A book of non-fiction about Ukrainian Stanislav Aseyev's time spent in the concentration camp, Izolyatsia prison, in the middle of occupied Donetsk. In his previous collection he was secretly documenting and reporting as a journalist from Donetsk before he was found and jailed in this concentration camp in Europe.
I've seen someone said that it's not a book but a bleeding open wound, and it reads like that. He describes the tortures, rapes but also psychological destruction in different stages.
At first, you can't believe that's your foreseeable life, you can't fathom that just outside there're buses with people going to work while people are tortured by sadists, you hope you'll be exchanged. Then there's apathy and disappearance of any empathy towards the other sufferers. Then it's obsessive thoughts and planning of suicide, the act of resistance and escape, the last choice you've got to prove yourself you're a human being still.
What's shocking to me is the nonchalance of it all and a complete lack of care to somehow hide torture like for example putting electrodes into peoples anuses and on ballsacks and electrocuting them. And why would they be secretive about it, Europe would still be buying oil and gas( it still does today although they had 8 years to diversify if they cared about Ukraine) and approve Nord stream 2, having business with russia while all this was happening.
The same people who ate up russian propaganda that Donbas and Crimea are really russian and people there just fight oppression against their russian language. Cause I gotta tell you, as a native russian speaker ethnic Ukrainian, I was never ever discriminated for speaking russian all around Ukraine. I was born in the part of Ukraine that had russian monopoly on culture and we didn鈥檛 have one!!! bookshop selling books in Ukrainian in population 800 000 city in Ukraine. And our tv and radio was full of low quality russian crap. Or do you think russian culture is Baryshnikov/Tolstoy/Rimsky-Korsakov lol? It was the other way around, like my native Ukrainian speaking husband had to switch to russian in the university in Kyiv because everything was in russian. So who鈥檚 the fucking oppressed, tell me?
The only way you would think that way is if you're fed the interpretation of the fact that Ukraine tries to protect Ukrainian from muscovy monopoly as an oppression by moscovian propaganda.
Anyways, back to the book.
Interestingly, being a Ukrainian journalist and political prisoner saved his life. There were also russians and separatists in the camp and those could be destroyed with impunity. Also interesting observations about particular religion and humor of jail. And the beauty of looking at the stars. And about losing his own religion.
He thankfully was eventually exchanged and freed. The book ends with Stas talking about his struggles of returning to civilian life, dealing with survivor's guilt and trying to find a reason to live.
A powerful book and I wish him to eventually heal as much as it is possible.
Dieses Buch kann man nicht bewerten, zumindest nicht im Schema 鈥瀏ef盲llt / gef盲llt nicht鈥�. Der ostukrainische Journalist Stanislav Aseyev schildert darin seine 28-monatige Gefangenschaft in der selbsternannten Donezker Volksrepublik (鈥濪VR鈥�). Fast zwei Jahre davon durchlitt er in der 鈥濱solation鈥�, einem geheimen Foltergef盲ngnis des russischen Geheimdienstes FSB. Selbst in der DVR stand dieser Ort au脽erhalb des Systems, die Gefangenen waren absolut rechtlos und die Administration allm盲chtig, vor allem deren sadistischer Chef 鈥濸alytsch鈥� (dt. Folterknecht).
Aseyev schildert nicht nur, sondern bem眉ht sich zu verstehen, was das Eingesperrtsein, die Schl盲ge, die Folter und die Angst davor aus ihm und den anderen Insassen gemacht haben und welche Methoden sie zum 脺berleben entwickelten. Mehrmals stand er kurz vor dem Selbstmord als letzte selbstgesteuerte Handlung. Er reflektiert auch das Verhalten der W盲rter, die die menschenverachteten Befehle der Administration umsetzen oder die Gefangenen auf eigene Faust qu盲len. Waren es etwas keine Menschen, die uns das angetan haben? Sind wir etwas nicht in einem Anfall von Wut und Rache in der Lage, all das zu wiederholen? Wie aber erkl盲rt man Gef眉hle? Das Gef眉hl, dass sich diese T眉r jeden Moment 枚ffnen kann und du weggeschleppt wirst 鈥� Wie erkl盲rt man den Menschen auf der anderen Seite, wie es hier war? Aseyevs Methode ist die Realit盲t dieses Ortes anhand von Ereignissen und Emotionen der Gefangenen zu vermitteln und dem Leser die M枚glichkeit zu lassen, durch die gelesenen Worte eigene Empfindungen in seiner warmen Wohnung zu entwickeln. Erniedrigung, K盲lte, Schmutz, Schl盲ge, dass k枚nnen wir vielleicht noch nachvollziehen. Aber die furchtbaren Schmerzen durch Stromfolter mit Elektroden an den Genitalien oder im Anus? Die Schmerzen, wenn immer wieder auf eine zerrissene Milz oder einen gebrochenen Knochen eingeschlagen wird. Brutalsten Vergewaltigungen von Frauen und M盲nnern?
Aseyev ist Journalist. Daher ist dies Buch keine Gef盲ngnisliteratur, wie die eines Solzhenizyn, Borowski oder Bruno Apitz. Vielmehr ist es die klinische Sektion eines Lebensabschnitts unter dem grellen Licht eines Operationstisches. Grauenhaft, aber notwendig.
PS: Das Umschlagbild ist 眉beraus passend. Nicht nur zeigt es einen wortw枚rtlich gebrochenen Menschen. Es schildert auch die 鈥瀞anfteste鈥� Folter in der Isolation, bei der sich die Gefangenen so lange schr盲g an eine Wand lehnen mussten, bis sie aus Ersch枚pfung zusammenbrachen.
PPS: Bei der Bildersuche f眉r diesen Review ist mir aufgefallen, dass es unter diesem Titel auch einen Dokumentarfilm gibt, der aber leider momentan in keiner Mediathek oder Streamingplattform verf眉gbar ist.
Dieses ersch眉tternde Zeugnis einer Gefangenschaft in einem Foltergef盲ngnis kann ich nicht bewerten. Es ist ein wichtiges Buch, das Assejew schon bald nach seinem dreij盲hrigen Aufenthalt in einem ehemaligen Fabrikgeb盲ude in Donezk geschrieben hat. Denn er hat ein Geschehen in Europa dokumentiert, das sich jenseits jeglichen Rechts ereignet und keine Menschlichkeit erkennen l盲sst. Dieses Gef盲ngnis, das offiziell nicht existiert, ist ein Ort absoluter Willk眉r und schlimmsten Sadismus. K枚rperliche Gewalt, das Sch眉ren von Angst und Dem眉tigungen aller Art sind an der Tagesordnung und das bei nahezu ununterbrochener 脺berwachung. Assejew beschreibt, wie er 眉berleben konnte, welche Strukturen sich bei den ganz unterschiedlichen H盲ftlingen, manche mit langen Gef盲ngniserfahrungen, ergaben, welche Hoffnungen und Bef眉rchtungen den Alltag neben der Gewalt beeintr盲chtigten. Er versucht zu ergr眉nden, wer die T盲ter sind und berichtet gleichzeitig von den Rachegedanken der Mith盲ftlinge. Dabei ist er der Meinung, wenn T盲ter sich bewusst beobachten k枚nnten, sich selbst bei der Tat in die Augen sehen, dann w眉rden sie das Gef眉hl von 脺berlegenheit verlieren und ihre eigene Erb盲rmlichkeit erkennen. Aus diesem Grund verbietet sich auch jegliche Rache.
Der letzte Teil des Buches widmet sich dem 脺berleben in der Freiheit. Das Schreiben des Buches wirkte da wie eine Selbsttherapie, die 眉ber die erste Zeit hinweggeholfen hat. Denn k枚rperliche Gewalterfahrungen und Dem眉tigungen sitzen so tief, dass es sehr sehr lange dauern wird, bis eine Heilung einsetzt. Aus der deutschen Vergangenheit wissen wir, wie lange traumatische Erlebnisse nachwirken und dass sie oft unbewusst an nachfolgende Generationen weitergegeben werden. Man kann nur ahnen, welche Nachwirkungen der Krieg in der Ukraine f眉r viele Menschen noch haben wird. Stanislaw Assejew ist zu w眉nschen, dass ihm sein Schreiben hilft, ins Leben zur眉ckzufinden und er mit seinen Erfahrungen zum Sprachrohr gegen Rachegedanken und f眉r ein unabh盲ngiges und kontrollierbares Justizsystem im eigenen Land wird.
..p膩r膩k jau nu ilgi es 拧o Gai拧o ce募u nomarin膿ju. un lai cik 拧墨 gr膩mata b奴tu skarba, esmu priec墨gs, ka t膩da ir izdota. paldies Lilitai par 拧o 5* d膩vanu.
艩墨 gr膩mata noteikti nav j膩izlasa katram. T膩 nav literat奴ras 拧edevrs. Ja k膩ds vienk膩r拧i dom膩, ka krievijas kar拧 Ukrain膩 ir necilv膿c墨gs, 募auns un drausm墨gs, ja k膩dam iek拧as grie啪as jau tikai no st膩stiem par Irpi艈u un Bu膷u, par krievu armijnieku r墨c墨b膩m tur - nevajag las墨t v膿l ar墨 拧o gr膩matu. Bet, ja ir iest膩jies atsl膩bums, ja s膩k 拧姆ist, ka 拧is kars nav nekas t膩ds, ka gan jau ukrai艈i tiks pa拧i gal膩 un visp膩r - cik var run膩t par vienu un to pa拧u - tie, j膩, lasiet un baudiet.
A remarkable book written by a former prisoner of Russia-controlled torture/detention place 鈥溞喰沸拘谎徰喲栄忊€� in Donetsk.
I avoided it for a long time 鈥� just did not want even to buy it. I respect 小褌邪薪褨褋谢邪胁 袗褋褦褦胁 a lot, follow him on facebook, and read all his interviews. He is a very intelligent and decent person, one of those journalists that make journalism a respectful profession again. Everything he said about 鈥溞喰沸拘谎徰喲栄忊€� is extremely important and extremely painful. I just thought that this book would be a concentrated reiteration of the same things that I have already read in the interviews, and I did not want to repeat this again for myself. However, at some point, I understood that I need to look at this book as well.
And you know what? It is very different from what I already knew from 小褌邪薪褨褋谢邪胁 袗褋褦褦胁鈥檚 publications on the Internet. It is very different from what you can expect from such a book in any case. I thought that this would be some heavy 鈥渧iolence porn,鈥� you know. Yes, it鈥檚 heavy, and yes, there is violence and unbelievable disgust and horror. And yet this book is also unexpectedly calm, reflective, analytical in the first place. The author does not want to shock you; he tries to understand what happened to him and his soul. Who were all those people, why they did what they did, and what to do with all this experience now. And how this place can still exist and still torture people 鈥� right now, at this very moment?
(For me, one of the most disgusting and painful things described in the book was not a specific torture or some other physical abuse but a very simple and truly shocking humiliation: all the prisoners are given a regular plastic bag (one of those that you use in supermarkets) and are forced to quickly put this bag on their heads when somebody enters the prison ward 鈥� so the prisoners cannot see their jailers and anybody who is checking on them. They are obliged to have this bag on their heads all the time when somebody from the jailers and torturers is standing there and every time when they are walked out somewhere. Being allowed not to cover their heads with plastic bags is a special privilege. 小褌邪薪褨褋谢邪胁 袗褋褦褦胁 mentions this horrifying practice as something very usual 鈥� probably not even realizing now how disturbing and revolting it is for an outsider. I suppose it鈥檚 a genius invention of a new generation of Russian state terrorists; Stalin would be very proud of them.)
The title of the book is probably misleading more than anything; you will not learn much about 鈥溠栄佈傂狙€褨褟 芯写薪芯谐芯 泻芯薪褑褌邪斜芯褉褍鈥� here 鈥� at least, in the traditional sense of 鈥渉istory.鈥� The book is a collection of random reflections about this and that, and much more introspective than descriptive. This, however, makes the book especially valuable as it invites you to think about the unthinkable and try to process this highly disturbing information into something useful. It would hardly teach you anything except for a way to stay human in utterly dehumanizing circumstances.
*
It became known yesterday that 鈥溌⌒惭栄傂恍感� 褕谢褟褏禄: 褨褋褌芯褉褨褟 芯写薪芯谐芯 泻芯薪褑褌邪斜芯褉褍鈥� has not received the award 鈥溞毿叫感承� 褉芯泻褍 BBC鈥� although it was in the shortlist in the category of 鈥渆ssay collections.鈥� I don鈥檛 know the winner (maybe that book is very much deserving the award) but I agree that 鈥溌⌒惭栄傂恍感� 褕谢褟褏禄: 褨褋褌芯褉褨褟 芯写薪芯谐芯 泻芯薪褑褌邪斜芯褉褍鈥� is probably too intellectual for 鈥溞毿叫感承� 褉芯泻褍 BBC鈥� which is clearly oriented to 鈥減opular literature鈥� (at least, in recent years). This book cannot be 鈥減opular,鈥� and not because it is bad or irrelevant. I suppose 鈥渁 regular reader鈥� just would not understand what it is about.
Gr膩mata, kas neietilpst kategorij膩s ''pat墨k / nepat墨k".
"鈥� J奴s te sak膩t: 鈥滳ilv膿ki, cilv膿ki.鈥� Bet kas j奴sos no cilv膿ka palicis? Cilv膿ki t膩 ner墨kojas. Ja esat cilv膿ki, tad k膩p膿c tr墨cat, kad atveras durvis? K膩p膿c pat kamer膩 staig膩jat, rokas aiz muguras saliku拧i? K膩p膿c tas tur negrib lieku reizi aiziet uz tualeti, lai nevajadz膿tu iet gar膩m aizkr膩sotajam logam? T膩p膿c, ka vakar cit膩 kamer膩 vi艈am pateica: V膿lreiz pien膩ksi pie loga 鈥� nieres tev nolaid墨sim un tad tevi pa拧u.禄 Logs ir aizkr膩sots, saproti? Aizkr膩sots! Tur neko nevar redz膿t! Ta膷u vi艈iem ir svar墨gi tur膿t tevi bail膿s. Plastmasas pudele noknak拧姆, un pagrabs lec k膩j膩s, visi jau gatavi maisu maukt galv膩, dom膩, ka veras durvis. Cilv膿ki鈥�"
well nothing much to add.. I would strongly recommend for everyone and even especially for '褉褍褋泻械 屑懈褉'-oriented people. (the book is divided into two translations, first half of the book is in Ukrainian and second in Russian).
Ir gr奴ti atrast v膩rdus, lai kaut ko pateiktu par gr膩matas saturu. Ir gr奴ti ar pr膩tu saprast v膩jpr膩tu, kas pasaul膿 dz墨vo visp膩r膩kaj膩 募aunuma form膩, cilv膿ka veidol膩. Ta膷u ir viegli saprast visp膩r膩ko cilv膿c墨bu, kas dz墨vo cilv膿k膩... un, dod Dievs, tai nekad nesatikties un netuvoties tai otrai.