Travels in Siberia (79 page)

fifteen to eighteen feet: This and many other details of prison camp life are from Dallin and Nicolaevsky,
Forced Labor in Soviet Russia
, pp. 9ff.

characteristic sounds of the camps: Conquest,
The Great Terror
, p. 318.

barrel of machine grease: Shalamov,
Kolyma Tales
, p. 175.

ate them on the spot: Solzhenitsyn,
The Gulag Archipelago
, 1:ix.

boundary indicated by pieces of red cloth: Shifrin,
Guidebook to Prisons
, pp. 169–70.

get a day or two off: Ibid.

More than a million died: Bobrick,
East of the Sun
, p. 422.

pray for atomic war: Solzhenitsyn,
The Gulag Archipelago
, 3:395.

the criminals in the camps were more dangerous: Varlam Shalamov, an inspiringly good writer who deserves to be more widely known, wrote many stories about the criminals of the camps and the dangers they posed. Shalamov’s first book published in the United States,
Kolyma Tales
, won praise from Saul Bellow and was nominated for a National Book Award. On the dust jacket of Shalamov’s second book,
Graphite
, his name was misspelled. Solzhenitsyn considered Shalamov’s own life a refutation of Shalamov’s claim that no one in the camps escaped corruption. Solzhenitsyn regretted that Shalamov renounced his own stories in 1972 (
The Gulag Archipelago
, 2:623).

named one puppy Ladle and the other Pail: Ginzburg,
Within the Whirlwind
, p. 7.

a prisoner named Krivoshei: Shalamov,
Kolyma Tales
, pp. 351ff.

some of the barbed wire: Jones,
Roads to Russia
, p. x.

9.2 million tons: Ibid., pp. 84–85.

sold handcuffs to the NKVD: Stephan,
The Russian Far East
, p. 236.

“On the mirror-like blade”: Shalamov,
Kolyma Tales
, p. 180.

a large Marion excavator: Conquest,
Kolyma
, p. 117.

very few prisoners sent to them survived: Lincoln,
The Conquest of a Continent
, p. 346.

the
Dzhurma
: A number of books tell the story of this ship. I have relied on Dallin and Nicolaevsky,
Forced Labor in Soviet Russia
, pp. 128ff. The triumphant rescue of the crew of the
Chelyuskin
is explained in abundant detail (with no mention of the
Dzhurma
) in an exhibit at the Museum of the Arctic and the Antarctic (see p. 177 in the above).

“It’s not the people who vote that count”: The original source of this quotation is
Vospominaniya Byvshego Sekretarya Stalina
, by Boris Bazhanov. The relevant passage (pp. 79–80) I translate as: “While the conversation proceeds at these heights, Stalin is silent and sucks on his pipe. Properly speaking, his opinion is of no interest to Zinoviev and Kamenev—they are convinced that in questions of political strategy, the opinion of Stalin generally has little of interest to offer. But Kamenev is a very polite and tactful man. Therefore he says, ‘And you, comrade Stalin, what do you think about this question?’ ‘Ah,’ says comrade Stalin, ‘about which question, exactly?’ (In fact, many questions had been brought up.) Kamenev, trying to get down to Stalin’s level, says, ‘On this question of how to win a majority in the party.’ ‘You know, comrade,’ says Stalin, ‘what I think concerning this question is: I regard as completely unimportant who will vote in the party, and how; but what is extremely important is who will count the votes, and how.’ Even Kamenev, who must know Stalin already, clears his throat significantly.”

on the cover of
Time
magazine eleven times: He was on the cover of the issues of June 9, 1930; February 24, 1936; December 20, 1937; January 1, 1940; October 27,
1941; January 4, 1943; February 5, 1945; July 17, 1950; October 6, 1952; March 16, 1953; and November 10, 1967. On three of the covers he appeared in a group with other world leaders. By comparison, Franklin D. Roosevelt was on the cover fourteen times, Churchill seven times, and Hitler five times. Stalin’s son, Lieutenant General Vasily Stalin, was on the cover once.

“You must ask Ivan Borisovich”: Herzen,
My Past and Thoughts
, p. 187.

than had been shot in the event: Figes,
Natasha’s Dance
, p. 460.

“The Holy Family,” by Domenico: The Hermitage website’s Digital Collection lists a painting called “The Holy Family with St. John the Baptist and St. Catherine,” by Domenico Beccafumi (Domenico di Giovanni di Pace), painted 1530–35. It is a good candidate for the painting Yakushkin admired. The provenance of this painting presents a slight hitch, however; the museum lists its source as unknown but adds that it was in the collection of V. D. Nabokov of Petrograd, and that the museum acquired it in 1919. V. D. Nabokov and his family, including his son, Vladimir, left Russia permanently in 1919. Whether this painting went from the tsar’s collection to the Nabokovs and then back to the Hermitage, and if so, how, are questions unanswered. Still, it is possible that the painting Yakushkin admired while under interrogation later hung on the Nabokovs’ wall.

Yakushkin had the cool-headedness: Iakushkin,
Zapiski
, p. 64.

The first three letters of Lukoil’s name: Goldman,
Petrostate
, p. 61. This is an excellent overview of the oil and natural gas industry in Russia, and of the recent oil boom.

the third-largest company: Ibid., p. 2.

Gazprom became the chief supplier: Figures on Russia’s natural gas exports to Europe are from
The New York Times
, October 5, 2004, p. W1.

“Russia is in a stronger position”: Goldman,
Petrostate
, p. 178.

“like a Holy Bible”: Ibid., p. 163.

In rural America: The improving fortunes of fur trappers in the United States during the years of the Russian oil boom can be followed in the pages of
Fur-Fish-Game
magazine. See, e.g., references to the Russian fur market in the magazine’s “Fur Market Report,” September 2009, p. 50.

His focus on Siberia: The most famous recent photo of Putin in Siberia is of him riding bare-chested on horseback in the Altai. This photo and similar ones, like the photo of him wearing khaki pants, a T-shirt, and a canvas bush hat while sitting in a tree in Tuva, were meant to evoke tales of Russian folk heroes, observers said.

“It was minus 45 degrees”: ITAR-TASS
Weekly News
, January 1, 2006.

the Environmental Protection Agency:
The New York Times
, October 15, 2009, p. A1.

“like cities on fire”: Ibid., March 28, 2006, p. C1.

a British public relations firm: The company’s name is Identica Branding and Design. See
The Washington Post
, May 11, 2003, p. A20.

the exact middle of Russia:
Moscow News
, December 5, 2008.

an Iridium satellite crashed: This event received extensive coverage at the time. The most detailed report about it appeared in
The Washington Post
, February 14, 2009, p. A3.

over the Taimyr Peninsula: For details of the collision, I am grateful to Paul “Mack” Insch (Capt. USN, ret.), and to Col. Richard W. Boltz, commander of the Joint Space Operations Center of Stratcom at Vandenberg Air Force Base, whose helpful e-mail Captain Insch forwarded to me.

“Siberia, where Russians waited”:
The New York Times
, May 17, 2008, p. C4.

What to make of this: Statistics and other gloomy information about Russia today are from assorted news sources described above. A concentration of bad news may be found in a
Washington Post
story, “Behind the Bluster, Russia Is Collapsing,” by Murray Feshbach, October 5, 2008, p. B3.

dying in car wrecks: The Russian accident figures are for 2008, the German figures are for 2007. See
The New York Times
, August 9, 2009, p. A8.

The government men confiscated: For information on the Memorial raid, see the letter from Orlando Figes to
The New York Review of Books
, January 15, 2009, p. 61.

a Russian television station conducted a poll: The station was Telekanal “Rossiya,” and the poll was called Imya Rossiya: Istoricheskii Vybor 2008.

MOGUCHESTVO ROSSII PRIRASTAT’ BUDET SIBIR’IO
: Mikhail Lomonosov (1711–65) was also a poet and historian, and the founder of the first university in Russia.

they forgot the Russian language: Rasputin,
Siberia, Siberia
, p. 303: “Maydell recounts how in one large Russian village in the Olekminsk Region, where he had traveled, not a single person understood Russian.” Olekminsk, founded 1635, is a city on the Lena River southwest of Yakutsk.

German cargo ships: “Arctic Shortcut, Long a Dream, Beckons Shippers as Ice Thaws,”
The New York Times
, September 11, 2009, p. A1.

scientists from the University of Alaska:
Natural History
, March, 2009, p. 12.

that kept the lake from freezing:
The New York Times
, October 25, 2005, p. F1.

The Decembrists: Information about the last years of Prince Sergei Volkonsky and other Decembrists may be found in Mazour,
Women in Exile
, p. 77; Sutherland,
The Princess of Siberia
, pp. 313ff; Barratt,
Voices in Exile
, pp. 19ff; and Haskett, “Decembrist N. A. Bestuzhev in Siberian Exile, 1826–1855.”

Adams, Charles Francis.
John Quincy Adams in Russia: Comprising Portions of the Diary of John Quincy Adams from 1809 to 1814
. Edited by Charles Francis Adams. New York: Praeger, 1970 [1874].

Alekseev, V. V.
The Last Act of a Tragedy: New Documents About the Execution of the Last Russian Emperor Nicholas II
. Translated by B. Ye. Yarubin, Ye. V. Alekseyeva, and W. H. Schettler. Ekaterinburg: Urals Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 1996.

Armstrong, Terence, ed.
Yermak’s Campaign in Siberia: A Selection of Documents
. Translated by Tatiana Minorsky and David Wileman. London: Hakluyt Society, 1975.

Arsenyev, Vladimir.
Dersu Uzala
. Translated by Victor Shneerson. Moscow: Raduga, 1990 [1934].

Asher, Oksana Dray-Khmara.
Letters from the Gulag: The Life, Letters, and Poetry of Michael Dray-Khmara
. New York: R. Speller, 1983.

Avvakum.
The Life of the Archpriest Avvakum by Himself
. Translated by Jane Harrison and Hope Mirrlees; preface by Prince D. S. Mirsky. London: Hogarth, 1924.

Babey, Anna M.
Americans in Russia 1776–1917: A study of the American Travelers in Russia from the American Revolution to the Russian Revolution
. New York: Comet Press, 1938.

Baddeley, John F.
Russia, Mongolia, China: Being Some Record of the Relations Between Them . . .
2 vols. Mansfield Center, CT: Martino, 2007 [1919].

Baikalov, Anatole V. “Notes on the Origin of the Name Siberia.”
The Slavonic and East European Review
29 (December 1950): 287–89.

Bancroft, Hubert Howe.
History of Alaska, 1730–1885
. San Francisco: A. L. Bancroft & Co., 1886.

Barratt, Glynn R. V.
The Rebel on the Bridge: A Life of the Decembrist Baron Andrey Rozen, 1800–84
. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1975.

———.
Voices in Exile: The Decembrist Memoirs
. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1974.

Bazhanov, Boris.
Vospominaniya Byvshego Sekretarya Stalina
[Memoirs of Stalin’s Former Secretary]. Paris: Tretyaya Volna, 1980.

Bell, John.
A Journey from St. Petersburg to Pekin: 1719–22
. Edited by J. L. Stevenson. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1966 [1763].

Bely, Andrey.
Petersburg
. Translated by Robert A. Maguire and John E. Malmstad. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1978 [1922].

Benyowsky, Mauritius August, Count de.
Memoirs and Travels
. Translated by William Nicholson. London: G.G.J.&G. Robinson, 1790.

Berlin, Isaiah.
Russian Thinkers
. New York: Penguin, 1979.

Beveridge, Albert.
The Russian Advance
. New York: Praeger, 1970 [1903].

Blakely, Alexander.
Siberia Bound: Chasing the American Dream on Russia’s Wild Frontier
. Naperville, IL: Sourcebooks, 2002.

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East of the Sun: The Epic Conquest and Tragic History of Siberia
. New York: Henry Holt, 1992.

Bookwalter, John Wesley.
Siberia and Central Asia
. New York: J. J. Little, 1899.

Bretschneider, E.
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. 2 vols. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner, 1910.

Brodsky, Joseph.
On Grief and Reason: Essays
. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1995.

Buchanan, James.
The Works of James Buchanan
. 12 vols. Vol. 2 (1830–36). Collected and edited by John Bassett Moore. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1908–11.

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The Slavonic and East European Review
15, no. 44 (January 1937): 377–88.

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Alaska at War
. Fairbanks: University of Alaska Press, 2008.

Chappe d’Auteroche, Jean.
A Journey into Siberia, Made by Order of the King of France
. London: T. Jefferys, 1770.

Chekhov, Anton.
“The Crooked Mirror” and Other Stories
. Translated by Arnold Hinchcliffe. New York: Kensington Publishing Corp., 1992.

———.
The Island: A Journey to Sakhalin
. Translated by Luba and Michael Terpak. New York: Washington Square Press, 1967.

Chernyshevsky, Nikolai.
What Is to Be Done?
Translated by Michael Katz. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989 [1863].

Clay, Cassius Marcellus.
The Life of Cassius Marcellus Clay: Memoirs, Writings and Speeches
. New York: Negro Universities Press, 1969.

Clot, André.
Haroun al-Rashid and the World of the Thousand and One Nights
. Translated by John Howe. New York: New Amsterdam, 1989.