Poland - History, 1939-1945 (Great Patriotic War) - History, European Theater - World War II - Resistance, World War II - Prisoners of War, European Theater - World War II - Soviet Union & Eastern Front, World War II - War Narratives, World War II - Perso

Without Vodka : Adventures in Wartime Russia

Name: Without Vodka : Adventures in Wartime Russia
Author: Aleksander Topolski
ISBN: 9781586420123

by Aleksander Topolski

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Overview

Aleksander Topolski was sixteen when he was called up for military service on the morning of August 24, 1939. In eight days his native Poland would be invaded by the Germans. Shortly thereafter, the Russians rolled in under the Hitler-Stalin pact, and when Topolski tried to sneak across the border into Romania, he was captured by Soviet border guards. Thus began a more than two-year-long ordeal through the Soviet Union's outrageously absurd penal system. Writing with an unexpected sense of humor and irony and an almost superhuman capacity for recalling fascinating details, Topolski recounts his fight for survival in the gulag. Mendacious NKVD officers, whimsical pick-pockets, ruthless youth gang members, wise political prisoners, Polish patriots, unfortunate Uzbechs, and countless other unforgettable characters populate this often raucous odyssey. The perplexing madness of Topolski's ordeal was perhaps summed up by an old Russian saying he heard along the way: "Without vodka you can't figure it out." Ultimately Topolski escapes into Iran to join the Polish Second Corps, assembling there to fight the Germans ... but that's another story.

About the Author, Aleksander Topolski

ALEKSANDER TOPOLSKI was born in 1923, the youngest of three children and the only son. He grew up in Pruzana in the Pripet Marshes of eastern Poland and in Horodenka, a small town in the southeastern corner of Poland. Following his two years in Soviet captivity, he joined the Polish Army loyal to the Polish Emigrée Government in London. A graduate in architecture from Manchester University, he practiced in England, Connecticut, Virginia, Puerto Rico, and the West Indies before settling in Canada. He has three grown children and lives with his wife, Joan Eddis, in Chelsea, Quebec.

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Editorials

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

At the beginning of World War II, Soviet troops arrested Topolski, a 16-year-old Pole, as he tried to sneak over the border into Romania to join the free Polish Army. The "adventures" described here are the ones the author endured over the next two years, as he was shuttled through the Soviet Union's labyrinthine prison system. As Topolski explains, the prisons were an experience in multiculturalism, as Jewish, Ukrainian, Central Asian, Polish and Russian prisoners mixed with others from the Caucasus Mountains. In the prison hierarchy, Poles and Jews were generally more educated, while Armenians, Georgians and Central Asians were often considered untrustworthy thieves and sexual offenders. The author himself used cunning, talent--he was able to elevate his status by passing as a draftsman-- and faith to keep himself alive. "Despite all that was going on around me, I held fast to my conviction that this was but a temporary reversal of fortune in my life." Topolski, who now lives in Canada, strikes the right balance between despair and humor as he describes the life of a teenager battling to survive. He pulls no punches in depicting the violence and hunger that were parts of daily life, but divulges little bitterness about his time in captivity. Indeed, he even offers some philosophical thoughts. While the book displays an understandable anti-Soviet animus, what emerges is the conviction that individuals--whether guards or prisoners--can control their actions, even in the worst of situations. (Jan.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.