Svetlana Alexievich’s Chorus of Fire

The German invasion of the USSR (including those portions of Poland that were incorporated into the Belarusian and Ukrainian SSRs after the Soviet invasion of Poland in September of 1939) occurred when the Germans terminated the Soviet-German alliance of 1939. For twenty-two months the Soviets were active allies of the Germans, invading Poland, fighting the Soviet-Finnish War and occupying the Baltic Nations, while also supplying grain and petroleum to Germany.

So yes, there is a myth of the Soviet Union in WWII and Ms. Alexievich chooses not to address the issue of the collaboration of the Soviets with the Germans.

With respect to "thousands of Belarusians died in the 1930's at Stalin's hand' - those were ethnic Poles who had been left behind the border of what was suddenly the Belarusian SSR. Stalin's murder of these Poles is well described by Timothy Snyder - the overwhelming majority of those people were killed in the western SSRs were ethnic Poles.

Sadly, Ms. Alexievich and the author of this article do not see those facts.

Finally, the author Adamovich is respected in the former Soviet Union for his novel which was used to deny the existence of the Katyn Forest Massacre (the murder of 24,000 persons, a Russian crime) by replacing it with the story of Khatyn (110 individuals killed by the Germans).

How can Alexievich celebrate an author whose entire oeuvre depends on a manipulation of history - and how then Valzhyna Mort continue to support that manipulation?

We read these books, we read these poems but we still inflict wars and support wars whether against "tyrants" or probable attackers of homeland. There are "good" and " just " wars but the sum total is enormous human suffering.

There are some things we read or films we see in our lives that stay with us forever and change us as human beings. As a young girl I saw Night and Fog, the film about the concentration camps. A bit later I read Hiroshima by John Hersey. Last night, I read the first chapter of Voices from Chernobyl. Svetlana Alexievich has captured a most horrific of horrors brought to a people. That chapter is powerful beyond words. It has seared into my soul, but that is a tiny fraction of what the Belarussian people have had to endure for so long. She deserves the Nobel. Thank you Ms. Alexievich for bearing witness.

Her books sound as if they might be a bit like those of the superb Italian writer Nuto Revelli.

Thank you,Ms. Mort,for this great article.
For me,Alexievich belongs to the strong post-WWII literary tradition in Belarus where, no matter which language one speaks, environment is the same – killing fields.
Hopefully,this Nobel Prize will bring about more English translations of these brilliant writers.

If the thin results from Amazon are any indication, her books are sadly not that easy to get. The sole copy I see of "War's Unwomanly Face" is on offer by an individual who's asking $2200 for it.

Congrats, Svetlana.

It will be interesting to see how her ideas in "War Does not Look Like a Woman" will be received in these parts of the world, among feminists and women in the US military. Do the issues raised in her book (or by the voices in her book) resonate with those of US women in the military and at war these days in Irak and Afghanistan or are these different creatures?

Alexievich may be a great author worthy of note.

However, I cannot understand why the Nobel Committee has ben so cowardly as to NOT award the Nobel Prize for Literature to Salman Rushdie, the greatest living author of the last 50 years?

Of course, perhaps Mr. Rushdie has asked to NOT be recognized as his status as a great author is guaranteed without such politically-motivated prizes, and probably it would be for Rushdie to NOT draw any more attention to himself.

I do not quite get why the tremendous death and destruction brought about by the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union is seen as a fable or a myth. The suffering and sacrifice indeed borne by people and soldiers to defend themselves from this invasion and to defeat--or help defeat--the Nazis is real. And it is heroic, despite the fear, the cowardice and all the pain of individuals. Why should they not be proud of their medals? Why not respected for their suffering and sacrifice? North Americans are for a much lighter involvement in that war. Let's not conflate all the wars. Is she taking a pacifist stance against all wars? The Soviet Union may be more about ideas than about individuals. The US is more about money and profit than about individuals and the welfare of people. Going to war to secure oil is not exactly a dignified motive of the great sacrifices that war entails.

Your should correct: the first German attack on the Soviet Union (Belarus) was in June 1941. Also, it's more appropriate to use Belarusian, not BelarusSian.

What a great article. I knew nothing about Alexievich, or Belarus for that matter. This writer, of this article, by the way, is also great. Thank you!

Here in America we live with the thought that we are free and able to move about without the checks so obvious in those nations whose lack of freedom we deplore, but when the half truths and lies we have been taught to believe about our democracy are uncovered, our freedom, like any serf's, is not even marginally better.

Even those who as tools, enforce the dictates of the oppressors and laud the value of our so called freedom are as trapped as the rest of us.

As in any nation dictating the will of men, our misnamed "society" exists for the overwhelming benefit of the unseen and unheard ruling class who have no allegiance to anyone beyond themselves let alone the people who protect their interests.

Doubtless this reads like some social diatribe to most of those who bother to read it, but when anyone stops to look, it is apparent few if any from the class that governs our nation wear the prostheses or struggle with the broken minds that bare the scars of war.

As a nation we have lived with a war economy which has bled our citizenry and emptied our coffers from our inception.

Svetlana Alexievich writes a truth about us through the tears of women, but we will never see it because we men are purposely blind to any fault that might even chip the altars we have built to worship ourselves.