Agnessa: A Gulag Memoir

After Mirosha

      After Mirosha       My  true  husband  was  Mirosha.  Not  Zarnitsky  and  not  even  Mikhail  Davydo-­‐‑ vich,  although  I  bow  to  his  intellect  and  talent.   But  Mirosha  was  no  more.  When  I  heard  “ten  years  without  right  of  cor-­‐‑ respondence”  I  understood—this  was  the  end.  All  sorts  of  rumors  circulated,   information   from   behind   the   stone   walls.   Abrashka   surfaced   again.   But   my   feeling  that  Mirosha  was  no  longer  alive  was  verified.  And  I  understood  that   Mirosha  would  never  come  back.   But  I  can’t  live  alone,  a  widow.  I  love  life  too  much.   Ivan  Aleksandrovich  had  written  me  twice  making  overtures  to  me.  He   wrote   that   he   was   married,   but   if   I   agreed   to   return   he   would   divorce   his   wife,  because  he  had  never  stopped  loving  me  and  he  still  loved  me.   I  answered,  “How  can  I   come  to  you,   how  can  I  abandon   my   husband   while  he  is  in  prison?”     I  didn’t  write  to  Ivan  Aleksandrovich  after  Mirosha  was  no  more.  I  had   already  been  spending  more  and  more  time  with  Mikhail  Davydovich.   View from the Outside: Maya, Mikhail Davydovich’s Daughter Papa’s   father   and   Mirosha’s   father   were   brothers.   Therefore,   Papa   and   Mirosha   were   first   cousins.   Papa   married   Mirosha’s   sister.   Both   families   were  from  the  Shuliavka  district  of  Kiev.  Mirosha’s  fortunes  improved  when   Grandmother   Khaya   bought   a   dairy   story   on   the   Kreshchatka   and   they   moved  out  of  the  Shuliavka  district.  Papa’s  family  remained  in  Shuliavka.   Papa  was  the  eldest  son  in  a  large  family.  He  dreamed  of  studying  but  was   never  able  to  pursue  his  studies  because  he  had  to  begin  working  at  an  early   age.     He  never  stopped  dreaming,  and  he  actually  went  through  a  gymnasium   curriculum   on   his   own;   self-­‐‑taught,   correspondence   courses,   a   voracious   reader.     When  he  was  only  a  child  he  served  as  an  apprentice  in  a  store.  He  would   stand   in   front   of   the   store,   whole   days   at   a   time,   yelling   at   the   top   of   his   lungs,  “Wool,  muslin,  calico,  sateen,stockings.”  Then  he  was  apprenticed  to   a  metal  engraving  business  and  began  to  bring  home  a  paycheck—pennies.     In  1910  Tolstoy  died.  Papa  was  so  struck  that  he  borrowed  money  to  go  to   the  funeral  in  Yasnaya  Polyana.       Grandmother  wailed  in  horror:  “No,  just  think  how  much  a  ticket  costs.  I   can’t   even   imagine   how   long   one   has   to   work   for   that   kind   of   money.   He   AFTER MIROSHA 133 needs  to  go  to  the  funeral  of  some  kind  of  a  count?  So  what  if  he’s  a  writer,   what  if  he’s  even  God  himself!  But  I  ask  you—what  for?  What  does  a  poor   Jewish  boy  have  to  do  with  a  Russian  count?”     Thanks  to  his  erudition  and  intellectual  development  Papa  had  many  ac-­‐‑ quaintances  among  Russian  and  Ukrainian  intelligentsia  families.  Once,  the   girls  in  one  of  these  families  were  trying  to  guess  who  Papa  was:  Armenian?   Greek?  Bulgarian?  One  of  them  suggested  that  he  might  be  a  Jew.  The  other   one  immediately  cried  out,  “Oh,  how  disgusting.”     After   that   Papa   always   presented   himself   to   his   acquaintances   like   this:   “So  that  in  the  future  you  won’t  be  disappointed,  I  want  you  to  know  that  I   am   a   Jew.   If   that   doesn’t   suit   you,   then   we   cannot   sustain   our   acquain-­‐‑ tance.“  Papa  had  a  great  sense  of  his  own  dignity.     Even  though  he  had  completed  his  external  studies  for  gymnasium,  he  was   not  able  to  take  the  examinations.  It  was  1912,  and  he  was  taken  into  the   army.  And  soon  after  the  First  World  War  began.  This  is  how  he  remembers   the  soldier’s  life.     Mikhail Davydovich’s Diary:1   Winter  1914–15.  I  march  with  a  company  on  sad  Polish  land.  I  am  a  soldier.   In  front  of  me  I  see  sweaty  necks  and  strong  legs  marching  in  formation.  I  am   part  of  a  huge  many-­‐‑legged  creature.  Above,  a  wet  grey  sky,  wet  and  grey   underfoot.   I   don’t   feel   the   fatigue   and   the   cold.   What   do   the   war   and   the   Germans  mean  to  me?  What  does  the  grim  soldier’s  story  mean  to  me?  I  have   a   more   profound   grief   that   means   more   to   me   and   my   personal   suffering.   More   than   once   I   saw   how   the   Don   Cossacks   hung,   slashed,   beat   my   co-­‐‑ religionists.   I   heard   their   cries   and   wails,   I   heard   and   saw   the   Cossacks’   bestial  hate  for  them.     I,   a   soldier   in   the   Russian   army,   was   transported   into   the   world   of   my   forebears  who  stood  meekly  before  their  God,  asking  him...