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One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Introduction

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich follows the events of an ordinary day for a zek, or Soviet concentration camp prisoner, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov, from his awakening to sleep. Partially because Solzhenitsyn had himself spent time in such a camp, its minute, concrete detail has absorbing power. Ivan, a former peasant carpenter who has little education, narrates the novel from a narrow first-person perspective with limitations appropriate to his character. Ivan himself is quite restrained, almost detached; however, his stoic determination and his craving for dignity deliver ...