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p Virgin Soil Upturned has a rather unusual history. Book Ono was published in Novy Mir in 1932. The same year, in his unpublished “Autobiography”, Sholokhov announced that he was working on Book Two.

p However, work on And Quiet Flows the Don was taking up a great deal of Sholokhov’s time and energy, and he could not get round to finishing Virgin Soil Upturned. Then during the war all the writer’s papers were lost, including this unfinished manuscript. As Sholokhov recounted it to K. Priyma:

p “All my papers, including the manuscript of Virgin Soil Upturned, were completely destroyed in the war years. I had given over the manuscripts of Tales from the Don, And Quiet Flows the Don, Virgin Soil Upturned, my correspondence with Stalin and Gorky, and other valuable material to the local archives—as I thought, for safe-keeping. As it turned out, it was as good as throwing them away. I just don’t understand how they lost them.... The manuscript of Book Two of Virgin Soil Upturned was lost with the rest. I’m now writing Book Two afresh and differently, since I didn’t like what I’d written before the war.”  [217•* 

p It must have required tremendous courage and willpower to start the book again from scratch after the war.

p Chapters of Book Two began to appear in newspapers and magazines from 1954 onwards and, as we have seen, the novel was completed by the end of 1959.

p Both in the writer’s biography and in the history of Soviet literature the two parts of Virgin Soil Upturned exist as one single whole and also as two separate books. While marvelling at the way Sholokhov achieved such 218 unity in the narrative despite the long interval in his work on the novel, one can hardly fail to notice how the time each of the books was written has left an indelible impression on their form and content.

p This automatically leads us to such important questions as the influence of the time of writing on the content of a novel, the nature of the author’s link with reality, and the temporary and eternal in art.

p At the time they were published (Book One in eight numbers of Novy Mir in 1932 and Book Two in Pravda, beginning in 1954) both books of Virgin Soil Upturned were contemporary in the fullest meaning of the word.

p The theme would appear to be the same in both: life in a Cossack village in 1930, collectivisation, the period of sharp and decisive change in social relationships. Yet even the most superficial comparison of the two books reveals, in addition to the unity of the narrative, Sholokhov’s new attitude to his characters and events which had evolved under the influence of developments during the intervening years. The Sholokhov who had completed And Quiet Flows the Don (in 1940), who had gone through the Second World War and the difficult post-war period, who had seen the tremendous changes taking place in our lives after the Twentieth Party Congress, could not help but have a different outlook to the Sholokhov of the thirties, and this new outlook naturally left its mark on Book Two of Virgin Soil Upturned.

p At present it is not possible to determine the exact moment when Sholokhov began writing Book One of Virgin Soil Upturned, or when he first began to plan it, for it lies in the shadow of And Quiet Flows the Don which was taking up most of his energy and attention in 1930. It is certain, however, that Sholokhov’s friends working in local Party bodies repeatedly begged him to write a book about collectivisation—the all-important event in their lives at that time.

p P. Lugovoi, then secretary of the Veshensky District Party Committee, confirms this: “I suggested that Sholokhov should interrupt his work on the third volume of And Quiet Flows the Don and write a novel about collectivisation, about the great changes in our life that were stirring the whole country and indeed the world at large.... I was apparently not the only one to suggest this to him."

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p Any writer who comes into contact with people a lot is familiar with such pressure being brought to bear on him, dictated by faith in his talent, and the desire to see contemporary reality portrayed in literature, on the stage, and indeed in all the arts.

p This pressure of public opinion is particularly strong at important turning-points in history. The arts cannot fail to reflect the impact of historic moments.

p Clearly Sholokhov himself felt the urge to respond to the impact of collectivisation and reflect it in his writing. He was after all personally affected by the changes taking place in the Cossack villages.

p Lugovoi tells how some time later Sholokhov appeared at the District Party Committee office and announced that he had put aside And Quiet Flows the Don and begun work on a book about the collective farms.

p Sholokhov apparently got down to actually writing the book at the end of 1930, and wrote the bulk of it in 1931-1932. This was a period of intense work for Sholokhov, for it must be remembered that he was completing the third volume of And Quiet Flows the Don in 1931.

p “He began to work even harder, as I noticed by his lamp,” Lugovoi goes on. “The point is, the electric light went off between 11 p.m. and midnight in those days, and the whole of Veshenskaya was plunged in darkness. Sholokhov would light a kerosene lamp and burn the midnight oil sitting over his manuscripts. When I came to see him in the morning, I noticed the lamp had run out of kerosene and the glass chimney was black with soot.”

p “I was writing Virgin Soil Upturned in 1930 soon after the events which had taken place in the village and radically changed village life: the liquidation of the kulaks as a class, collectivisation everywhere, and the mass movement among the peasants to join the collective farms,”   [219•*  Sholokhov wrote in 1934.

p Sholokhov had just finished book three of And Quiet Flows the Don which tells of the most difficult days in the history of the Don Cossacks and in the lives of his beloved heroes—the Upper Don uprising of 1919. He already envisaged the tragic finale, the ruined life of Grigory Melekhov....

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p The events of the Revolution and the Civil War described in And Quiet Flows the Don were still fresh in the memory of many of the heroes of the new novel, for only ten years had passed.

p Here now was another revolution in the life of the people. The age-old foundations were uprooted in a terrible, fierce struggle. “Life in Gremyachy Log was up on its hind legs, like a restive horse at a tough hurdle" (1, 102).  [220•* 

p How would the Cossacks behave—and indeed not only the Cossacks, for the events described in Virgin Soil Upturned were more or less typical of the country as a whole? And what was the peasantry like, now that the Civil War was over and Soviet power had been established?

p Sholokhov was not an objective chronicler of events. That was not in his line. The people involved were those among whom he had been born and bred, and still lived. He wrote Virgin Soil Upturned (which was originally entitled With Blood and Sweat) not simply because he was struck by the drama and the historical importance of the events he was witnessing, but because of a profoundly human inner need to help others find the right path, and thus set up the new world.

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p Virgin Soil Upturned is not just a book about the period of collectivisation. Sholokhov saw much that was universal in the concrete historical conditions of that time.

p L. Pasynkov recalls how in a conversation he and Gorky had in the spring of 1932 on “the truth of Soviet books”, the latter made the following remark about Sholokhov’s books:

p “Not everyone in this country yet appreciates how attentively and seriously the more far-sighted people in the West regard the themes of our best books....

p “The more intelligent readers there realise that the development of the subject in Sholokhov’s two books, 221 for example, is not a matter of the author’s whim but is a serious reflection of real life, which cannot be ignored in Paris or in Rome. That’s why people in Europe regard Sholokhov’s books as reality itself.”  [221•* 

p Gorky’s words “the development of the subject in Sholokhov’s two books ... is a serious reflection of real life" underline a very important feature of And Quiet Flows the Don and Virgin Soil Upturned. Their plot is determined by important historical facts. Sholokhov is at once poet and sociologist: the two are fused inseparably.

p The heyday of the novel, the time of its greatest popularity, was the 19th century, the age of realism in the arts. Great works of literature were then full of tortured thoughts on the relationship between man and society, on the purpose of life and 011 ways of attaining justice and happiness.

p The novel is a particularly broad genre which can combine tense, dramatic dialogue with lyrical interludes and the personal thoughts of the author. It can thus produce a real world, with strikingly natural situations and an exceptional degree of authenticity. With the emergence of the novel, literature began to recreate the flux of life, as it were, in all its variety and complexity, before our very eyes.

p The 19th-century novel was above all social. The novelist set out to give an overall picture of life, make generalisations, analyse human feelings and show man the world he lived in. The Russian novel, for example, aroused the awareness of the masses, and was an important stimulus to the development of social and political thought.

p The socialist realist novel inherited these democratic and realistic traditions.

p The alienation of the novel from social reality, which occurred in the 20th century, has led to the form itself losing its characteristic unity, harmony and completeness. Modernisation and new forms merely served to cover up the fact that the novel was gradually losing its original synthetic nature, was ceasing to be an artistic apprehension of the laws and patterns of history, social relations, etc.

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p In the twenties and thirties we were constantly hearing of the decline of the novel. Today the end of the novel is once more the subject of lively discussion in many countries. There are those who are ready to bury it, declaring it to have outlived its time, others who merely shake their heads sadly and limit themselves to talking of a crisis, and yet others who insist that the genre is still in its prime and holds untapped resources.

p From 1956 onwards such polemics have been going on in France, Italy, England and many other countries, with leading writers and literary critics taking part.

p A discussion about the novel was held in the Soviet Union in 1960 on the pages of Literaturnaya Gazeta and Novy Mir. Argument about the contemporary novel and its future development broke out again during the broad discussion on humanism organised by the Gorky Institute of World Literature in 1962.

p Finally, in August 1963, the question was brought up at the forum of the European Community of Writers.

p The reasons for these arguments and disagreements, as I see it, are not the same for the literatures of the socialist world and the literatures of the capitalist countries.

p In reply to questions put to him by the magazine Nuovi Argomenti (No. 38-39, 1959), Alberto Moravia declared that it was not so much a question of the crisis of a genre as of a crisis in the relationship between contemporary art and reality. Moreover, Moravia considered that socialist realist art was also undergoing this crisis.

p Let us investigate how far this is true.

p There is certainly no doubt about there being a crisis of the bourgeois novel. It can be seen quite clearly in the loss of the popular epic foundation. Man as a social being, man uniting the individual and the social disappears, and the novel disintegrates. If novelists renounce synthesis and an epic portrayal of reality for the sphere of the subconscious and the pathologically unstable and so on, the novel becomes no more than a code for the initiated, remaining completely unintelligible for the vast majority of readers.

p The novel of the absurd, for example, and the heterogeneous new school of the novel in France which would appear to be opposed to it (Alain Robbe-Grillet, Nathalie Sarraute, Michel Butor), are essentially based on 223 subjectivist concepts. They accept a priori the theory that man is an unknowable quantity, and deny the novel the epic quality which is its essential feature.

p In 1962 Literaturnaya Gazeta published an article by Andre Maurois, a member of the Academie Francaise, in which he had the following to say about contemporary French writers: “Many of them are extremely talented and very ingenious in their search for new subjects and forms. But they make no effort to be understood by the wide reading public. On the contrary, they are shy of such popularity and try to discourage the reader with disordered thoughts, an absence of connected narrative, and fanciful style. They also discourage him with the sinister picture they draw of life. Their world is the world of the absurd. Man is unable to understand why he has been thrown into this world. He suffers and his sufferings are futile.”  [223•* 

p Obviously a crisis of subject-matter lies at the root of the crisis of the contemporary bourgeois novel. I mean the bourgeois novel that is breaking with realism, for wherever the novel is developing according to democratic traditions it is still thriving.

p The future development of the novel will depend on the answer to such questions as: can we know man and his inner world, what is the relationship between man and his time, between man and the life of his country, man and his era. Disconnected narrative, the loss of inner artistic logic and the decline of form occur where an integral world outlook is lacking, where human life itself appears to be a disastrously chance and inexplicable thing, and realistic study of life is replaced by mere subjective caprice and horrific nightmares.

p Arguments about the contemporary novel here in the Soviet Union and in socialist countries have arisen for quite other reasons.

p But first a word or two about the nature of these arguments.

p They largely began with some pretty sharp criticism of monumentality and the epic element. Thus, M. Kuznctsov’s article “The Ways the Contemporary Novel Is Developing Along" which opened the discussion in 224 Novy Mir (No. 2, 11)00) quite clearly counterposed lyrical prose to the monumental novel with its sweeping depiction oi’ historical events. Yuri Bondarev, famous for his line war stories, declared in the magazine Voprosy Literatury that the short-story was taking over as the leading genre.

p The way the short-story and the novel were contrasted, and the assertion that the former was the leading genre had its origin in the conditions of the concrete situation obtaining which were of a temporary nature. The personality cult had given rise to a tendency towards pomponsness and false monumentality in art. One of the changes that came about in the life of society after the Twentieth Party Congress was the reappearance of direct personal experience and individuality in art. “I think so and so”, “I saw...” and so on, were back in. The result was a flourishing of lyrical prose, a growth of the lyrical element in literature, the insistence on the short-story as the leading genre, and so on.

p It would be wrong to insist too much on the aesthetic value of these new trends. Subjectivity in narrative form inevitably imposes limits on the writer’s field of vision and in the long run limits his expression of his social outlook.

p Is it indeed true at all that the novel has given way to the short-story and the novelette? Surely it would be more accurate to speak of a certain deceleration, a seeming halt in development, due in my opinion to the important historical changes taking place in Soviet life since the Twentieth Party Congress, changes in the very character of Soviet man, the new relationship between man and society, the moral problems now facing every individual.

p The novel is particularly sensitive to changes in social life, psychology and relationships. But the truth is, it has a delayed reaction. A time Jag is necessary for really worthwhile novels to appear. Yet once it has collected the facts, so to speak, and had time to digest them, it takes such a step forward in comprehension and aesthetic assimilation of the age as can rarely be equalled by any other genre. A good novel is always a revelation. It leads us along the highways of history, enabling us to interpret the essence of the conflicts determining the 225 development of human society. The novel shows us human life in all its complexity, so that in it we can comprehend man and the age he lives in.

p Sholokhov in his novels shows a remarkable ability to create a picture of life, full of powerful action and new characters, a picture that captivates the reader with its variety and wealth of original details and observations, carefully avoiding the casual, temporary or secondary, which is so often mistakenly accepted as important.

p One of the most admirable traits of Sholokhov’s talent is his ability to portray real life, capturing those features characteristic of the age in bold relief, with classical clarity.

p Many novels and stories were written about collectivisation. It was the subject of such works as Bruski (1928-1937), a novel in several volumes by Fyodor Panferov; Hatred (1931), a short-story by I. Shukhov which Gorky thought very highly of; Y. Permitin’s novels (Claws— 1928, The Trap—1930, and The Enemy—1933); V. Stavsky’s short-story Running Start (1930), and Stanitsa, a book of sketches written in 1929.

p But only Sholokhov’s Virgin Soil Upturned not merely captured life in all its power and infinite colour and variety but caught the very spirit and meaning of those years.

p It was as if Sholokhov was looking back on his time from the vantage point of the future, singling out with remarkable sureness the most important features that were to be essential in life and in the development of his heroes’ characters for years to come.

p Sholokhov’s art is constantly concerned with the relationship between man and property, which was already an important theme in Russian realist literature of the 19th century.

p In the epic canvases in Virgin Soil Upturned Sholokhov showed man gradually revealing his creative potential as he freed himself from the power of the property instincts of the past.

p In Tales from the Don (1923-1926) Sholokhov could still make “who will win" a vital issue. In Virgin Soil Upturned there is no longer any doubt that socialism will triumph, for it is assured by the whole previous development of Soviet society.

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p The literature of socialist realism sets out to depict reality in all the complexity of the struggle between new’ and old. In Virgin Soil Upturned the battle is fought along the whole wide front of life. There is the struggle between the poor and middle peasants on the one hand and the kulaks and whiteguards on the other, and between two types of leadership represented by Davidov and Nagulnov. Then there are the more personal conflicts, as between Lushka and Nagulnov, and Marina and Razmyotnov, and the gradually developing socialist awareness of the working masses, as in the way Kondrat Maidannikov overcomes his “sneaking regret" for his own property.

p The collective-farm plough turned up the virgin soil of property instincts, all the deeply rooted prejudices, views and relationships that had grown up over the centuries^ The psychological effects of this revolutionary change were no less important than the socio-historic effects.

p The tragic figure of Grigory Melekhov, casting this way and that in his search for the right path, was now fading into the past.

p Kondrat Maidannikov’s “cursed hankering" for his property and his inner drama were but a weak echo of those spiritual torments which Grigory Melekhov went through in the years of the Revolution and Civil War.

p It is no longer the Melekhovs, but people like Maidannikov, Lyubishkin, Ushakov, and Shaly who are now representative of the Cossack village.

p The social instability and dual social and psychological nature of the peasant who was half-labourer, half-property owner were slowly becoming a thing of the past as history took its course. Such was the great humanistic essence of the revolutionary changes Sholokhov describes in Virgin Soil Upturned.

p The whole novel is imbued with Sholokhov’s deep understanding of the historical process. While giving a picture of that particular period through its unforgettable concrete events, Sholokhov at the same time shows it as a link in the chain of historical development. The Civil War years are still fresh in people’s hearts and memories. Davidov, Nagulnov, Razmyotnov and Kondratko look back upon them with the pride of the victors; Polovtsev and Ostrovnov with the bitterness that comes with 227 defeat, an angry longing to launch a new armed struggle to settle old scores.

p Sholokhov shows the present as the outcome of the past (the Revolution and the Civil War), and the seeds of the future germinating in the present. The description of the first spring after the organisation of the collective farm, and the competition in Lyubishkin’s brigade at sowing time acquire a special significance as a glimpse of the future of the collective farm, and of the way the characters will develop. The future belongs to such people as Davidov, Razmyotnov, Maidannikov and Lyubishkin.

Sholokhov’s faithful application of the historical method in Virgin Soil Upturned determined many of the compositional features and elements of the plot.

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p The precipitous development of events in Virgin Soil Upturned is especially evident when compared with the epic sweep and leisurely pace of And Quiet Flows the Don. The former has almost nothing of the latter’s excursions into family history (the Melekhovs, the Mokhovs, the Listnitskys, and the Korshunovs), changes in scene of action (from the Don to the front, to Petrograd, the Kuban and so on) or long digressions by the author which are so much a feature of And Quiet Flows the Don.

p “The composition of Virgin Soil Upturned is better than that of And Quiet Flows the Don. There are less characters, and I didn’t have to rush from the Don to the Kuban, all the time changing the scene of action,”  [227•*  wrote Sholokhov.

p While we hardly think that words like “better” or “worse” are applicable at all, we do appreciate that compositionally Virgin Soil Upturned must have been easier for the author, as there are fewer heroes, a fixed scene of action, and a comparatively limited time-span.

p The action of Book One of Virgin Soil Upturned takes place in the first five months of 1930. The setting up of the collective farm at Gremyachy Log is described stage by stage, almost entirely in chronological order. March is particularly packed with dramatic events, the happenings 228 are described day by day, nothing is left out, even such a small matter as Marina Poyarkova, Andrei Razmyotnov’s sweetheart, handing in her resignation from the collective farm on the 26th.

p Let us take a look at the hidden mainsprings of the action, which produce the upheavals and determine the outcome of the conflicts.

p Whereas the 19th-century novel was mainly concerned with the individual, or the relationship between the individual and society, the whole plot of Virgin Soil Upturned hinges on an event of great historical importance in the life of the people. The revolution in the life of the peasants which ended in the victory of the collectivefarm system, and the implacable struggle of the forces of socialism with the remnants of the world of privateproperty relationships are what determine the “connections, contradictions, sympathies, antipathies and indeed all human relationships" in Virgin Soil Upturned.

p The novel contains a most remarkable wealth of characters and human types. There are those like the worker Semyon Davidov, Makar Nagulnov, Razmyotnov, and Kondratko, who dedicate all their thoughts and wishes, indeed their whole lives, to the high and noble aim of building socialism. There are the poor villagers like Lyubishkin, Ushakov, and Shaly, for whom the collective farm means the beginning of a new life in which they gain basic human dignity for the first time; Grandad Shchukar, the notorious story-teller; Khoprov, member of a punitive detachment during the Civil War and now finding the courage to openly oppose Ostrovnov and Lapshinov; Borshchov, who had been bought off by the kulaks. Then there are the kulaks—former Red partisan Tit Borodin, Lapshinov, a fence who also sold candles in church, Frol the Torn and Ostrovnov, and the whiteguards Polovtsev and Latyevsky. In the course of the action all these characters fall into one of two perfectly distinct groups, two irreconcilable class camps. Thus the leitmotiv of Virgin Soil Upturned is the socio-historical conflict.

p The events described in Book One which serve to reveal a great deal of the characters’ natures were largely based on actual events. With a few local variations these developments were typical of collectivisation throughout the 229 country and not only on the Don. Basically, the pattern of events was as follows: a meeting of the poor peasants and Party activists, the beginning of the expropriation of the kulaks, general meetings, the pooling of implements and draught animals, the battle with mass slaughtering of cattle provoked by enemies, the laying in of seed stocks and so on__

p In recreating the conditions in which the characters of his novel move and have their being, Sholokhov aimed at maximum authenticity and historical accuracy. He drew on concrete reality even to the point of frequently dating events exactly: “...On February 4th a general meeting of the collective farmers passed a resolution exiling the kulak families from the territory of the North Caucasus...”; “He returned from his journey on March 4th...”; “At evening on the tenth of March a mist descended on Gremyachy Log”; “By the fifteenth of March the seed-grain fund had been gathered in completely”; “On the morning of March 20th the postman arrived in Gremyachy Log with the newspapers that had been delayed by the floods and that contained Stalin’s article Dizzy with Success”; “On the twenty-seventh Davidov decided to drive out to the first team’s field...”; “By May 15th most of the district’s grain crops had been sown".

p Here we see one of Sholokhov’s chief aesthetic principles at work. “When the writer violates the truth even in the slightest detail,” he said, “he makes the reader suspicious and think ’perhaps the important details are untrue too’.”

p Absolute historical authenticity helped Sholokhov to show the great significance of the events described, and also to stress their uniqueness.

p Of course, the plot of a work of literature is more than a sequence of events in their correct chronological order. The character grouping, the time the different characters are brought into the action are also important aspects of plot composition, expressing as they do the author’s attitude to the events described, his ideological and aesthetic standpoint.

p In a radio broadcast on April 5, 1952, Sholokhov had the following to say about the difficulties facing the novelist:

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p “One can compare work on a novel to a construction job, with the difference that while on a real building site every worker’s tasks and duties are strictly assigned and limited, the writer has to be a jack-of-all-trades—the man who prepares all the various materials to be used, architect, mason, and construction engineer rolled into one.... Unfortunately, it frequently happens that due to a change in some important aspect of the writerarchitect’s plan while work is in progress, what the writermason has already done is razed to the ground.”

p This interesting comparison gives us a clear idea of the nature of the novelist’s work and the difficulties involved. What is more, the possible drama in the relationship between architect-planner and mason-builder that Sholokhov states so clearly, helps us find the right approach to studying the plot composition.

p But then the way events are strung together in a novel is very different from the strong framework of a building, which has nothing of the flexibility, give and freedom, which is such an essential feature of the continuous flux of life.

p In Virgin Soil Upturned it is not only the socially significant events of collectivisation which make up the subject. Through their particular relationships with one another, the characters exert a considerable influence on both the course of events and their nature.

p Chronological order is not observed at the beginning of the novel. Davidov has in fact arrived in Gremyachy Log before Polovtsev. We hear of his arrival from Ostrovnov: “They say some worker or other came here this evening from the district to drive us all into the collective farm" (1, 26).

p If one tries to put the events described in chapters one and two into chronological order one finds that the plot loses considerably. It is more than a question of interest and arousing the reader’s curiosity: the dramatic mainspring of the action is wound down and the socio-historic conflict which lies at the root of the novel reveals its true content and meaning far less strikingly.

p The talented writer organises his plot by concentrating events, shuffling them and rearranging them in what appears to be the only possible order which reveals so well the characters, “connections, contradictions, 231 sympathies, antipathies and indeed all human relationships".

p The first three chapters of Virgin Soil Upturned are a good illustration of the masterly way in which Sholokhov creates the inner links between events and reveals the social arid psychological factors that condition his heroes.

p First the secrecy that surrounds Polovtsev’s arrival, and the aura of mystery around Ostrovnov. In chapter one we have learned that Polovtsev is a former Cossack caplain and that he has come to Gremyachy Log from a long way away. But we are kept guessing as to why he has come and who Ostrovnov is.

p Here the natural sequence of events is interrupted. Our attention is switched to other people: the Secretary of the District Party Committee, the Leningrad worker Davidov, local Communists Nagulnov and Razmyotnov, and the group of Cossacks outside the building of the village Soviet, including Grandad Shchukar.

p In that very first conversation with Davidov about the Association for Joint Working of the Land, Razmyotnov mentions Ostrovnov: “The chairman they need is Yakov Lukich Ostrovnov. There’s a man with a head on his shoulders!... He grunts a bit when we come down on him for his taxes, but he’s a good farmer, he has a certificate.” Nagulnov shakes his head doubtfully (1, 23).

p Ostrovnov appears in his true colours in chapter three, when the purpose of Polovtsev’s visit is revealed—to rouse the peasants to revolt against Soviet power.

p Davidov’s arrival was the impulse giving rise to those important events which revolutionised life in Gremyachy Log and, indeed, throughout the country.

p The fact that Polovtsev’s arrival coincides with that of Davidov is obviously a device of the author. The two figures, who never actually meet face to face, are opposite, both as representatives of different social forces and as personalities.

p Being the products of the forces of history, they are largely responsible for the turn of events and for the destinies of other characters in the novel. Each of them has the strength and firm conviction to make them a centre of attraction, and they polarise the contending forces in Gremyachy Log.

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p However, freedom of action and freedom of historical choice are different for Davidov and Polovtsev. The former’s actions are determined by clear awareness of the laws and regularities of historical development, and the humanistic ideal of the general weal. Polovtsev tries not only to hold up the inevitable course of events but even to turn back the tide and restore those conditions that existed in Rvissia before the Revolution.

p Crippling defeat, in the Civil War did not reconcile him to reality, but embittered him and made him thirst for revenge.

p Polovtsev rides into the village under cover of darkness. Sitting in the kitchen of Ostrovnov’s house, “from under his prominent wolfish brow he cast a swift glance round the room" (1, 10). There we already have clearly, if indirectly, expressed the author’s attitude to one of the two forces that are about to come to grips.

p Thus, in the very first chapters of the novel the forces and even individual characters that are going to enter into violent conflict in Gremyachy Log have already been indicated. The position they take is dependent on their attitude to the incipient collectivisation.

p The present is linked up with the past it grew out of—-the Civil War. Polovtsev persuades Ostrovnov that collectivisation spells ruin for the Cossacks. “Do you remember, in Yekaterinodar I think it was, during the retreat, I had a talk with my Cossacks about Soviet rule? Even then I warned them, remember?... ’The Communists will get you under, they’ll twist you like a ram’s horn....’ Wasn’t I right?" (1, 27).

p The truly epic nature of the plot comes out in chapter four, at the meeting of the poor peasants, where the popular masses come forward to take an important part in events. The collective portrait, the polyphonous dialogue, and the characters on whom the spotlight falls (the former partisan Lyubishkin, Arkashka the Bargainer, the sharptongued Dyomka Ushakov and Borshchov, that gloomy, cowardly defender of the kulaks) give a striking picture of the real hopes and fears of the Gremyachy Log peasants.

p The dynamics of “through action" develops rapidly (we learned that the meeting was to take place in the very first chapter from the words of Ostrovnov; the 233 meeting also marks the beginning of Davidov’s work in Gremyachy Log).

p The scene is an epic fusion of the general and the personal. The action was set off by an impulse from above and meets with strong response and support from below.

p “‘Don’t give us your propaganda! We’ll come into the collective farm body and soul!...’

p “’We agree with the collective farm!’

p “’If we’re together we can do anything.’

p “‘But it’s got to be run proper’" (1, 35).

p The crowd scenes in Virgin Soil Upturned show the “revolution in the minds of men" which took place during collectivisation, and how slowly but surely, and not without occasional reverses and retreats, the new collectivist outlook gradually replaced property feelings and prejudices.

p The crowd in the novel is never a faceless, impersonal mass, it always has distinct social and psychological features, whether it be the crowd of activists and poor peasants of Gremyachy Log receiving the news of collectivisation as the answer to their most vital needs (chapter four), or the wider circle, as regards social composition, present at the general village meeting, where the middle farmers’ voices were also heard—the voices of people like Maidannikov who are all for the collective farm, of the waverers, who would rather sit on the fence and “see what happens”, and of those who are openly opposed, either sucking up to the kulaks or themselves outright enemies of the people (chapter nine). Or again, there are those Cossacks who recoiled from Polovtsev for their own personal reasons yet spoke as one man when it came to condemning his activities as anti-popular and unpatriotic (chapter twenty-seven); or that jubilant, excited crowd greeting the blacksmith Ippolit Shaly with jokes and words of encouragement when he was rewarded publicly for fulfilling his repair-work plan in record time (chapter twenty-six).

p What we are shown is the triumph of the new not only in the hearts of certain individuals, like Kondrat Maidannikov or Ippolit Shaly, but in whole social groups of the working Cossacks. The individual characters and their actions are filled out and gain body through the description we have of the way socialist ideals penetrated 234 the masses, including the most backward section. Sholokhov gives a remarkably complete picture of the people’s advance towards socialism. There is surely not a single social group in Gremyachy Log whose position during the period of collectivisation was not truthfully, comprehensively shown from many angles. While during the Civil War the majority of the Don Cossacks followed the kulaks and whiteguards, they had now largely come down on the side of the Soviet government. The middle farmer Kondrat Maidannikov ends his application to join the collective farm with the words: “I ask to be allowed into the new life, as I am in full agreement with it" (1, 92).

p Nevertheless, getting the collective farm started was no easy matter. There was even active resistance: the villagers slaughtered their cattle and carted away the seed grain, and the women almost beat Davidov to death. Yet even in their open resistance the Cossacks tried to keep within the bounds of Soviet law—as they’understood it, of course. Rather than force the locks on the barns, they try to get the keys from Davidov, the collectivefarm chairman, and make Razmyotnov, as chairman of the local Soviet, to open a meeting.... However much they might hesitate and waver, the villagers of Gremyachy Log in 1930 are Soviet people, and no enemies can get them to rise against Soviet power. The most they can do is provoke their discontent and temporarily pull the wool over their eyes, by capitalising on the difficulties encountered in organising the collective farm and their deeprooted habits and property prejudices.

p The whiteguard camp can find no firm support even among the Cossacks who are most hostile to the collective-farm system. When Polovtsev shouts at an old Cossack who is a member of the counter-revolutionary organisation he has formed, for referring to Stalin’s article Dizzy with Success, a “stocky Cossack of about forty ... stepped out from the men crowded against the wall and spoke challengingly, fiercely: ’Don’t start yelling at our old men, comrade ex-officer, you did enough yelling at them in the old days. We’ve had enough of your high and mighty ways, now you’ve got to talk to us polite. Under the Soviets we’ve got out of the habit of such treatment, understand?’" (1, 257).

235

p These were the words of one of the Cossacks Polovtsev had carefully chosen as the core of future insurgent detachments, of a man who considered himself “wronged” by Soviet power. It is not difficult to see why Polovtsev failed to incite the Cossacks to revolt.

p These Cossacks, on whose support to judge by all appearances Polovtsev could reasonably have been expected to count, came out with a whole system of arguments  evidencing their unwillingness to take action against Soviet power. Their words express awareness of the invincible strength of Soviet power and a deeply patriotic attitude towards the “allies”, whose support would lead to the enslavement of Russia, and a memory of their personal hungry existence in exile. There is a feeling of injured dignity in the words of the Cossack: “Under the Soviets we’ve got out of the habit of such treatment....”

p In shifting our attention from one social group to another, Sholokhov shows us how the process of revolutionary reconstruction gradually moulded that unity which brought the Soviet people victory in the war against nazi Germany. “...It seems this here newspaper will be parting us from you,” an aged Cossack tells Polovtsev on behalf of the others, after they have read Stalin’s article in Pravda and Molot. “We’re not against Soviet power,” says another, “we’re against the disorders in our own village, but you wanted to turn us against the whole Soviet power. Nay, that won’t suit us!" (1, 258).

p When, during their first conversation at the beginning of the book, Ostrovnov asks doubtfully: “How will people look at it? Will they support us?" Polovtsev answers confidently with the following cynical remark: “The people are a flock of sheep. They’ve got to be led" (1, 30-31).

p The decisive defeat of Polovtsev and his like exploded once and for all the counter-revolutionary upper-class myth of the historical inertia of the masses.

p The real historical awareness and activity of the masses is strikingly revealed in the crowd scenes of Virgin Soil Upturned.

p In And Quiet Flows the Don the people in the crowd scenes were often nameless Cossacks, soldiers, Red Army men and sailors who stood out sharply in the composition of the epic. The revolutionary masses were mainly 236 presented in the crowd scenes, and through minor or incidental characters.

p In Virgin Soil Upturned on the other hand, the Cossack masses and the major heroes are almost always directly related in the crowd scenes. This is the case with Davidov and the Gremyachy Log activists (chapter four); Davidov and Maidannikov at the general meeting for the establishment of the collective farm (chapter nine); Razmyotnov at the meeting which took a resolution to evict the kulak families, and chose a name for the farm (chapter thirteen); Davidov, Ostrovnov and Grandad Shchukar at the enlarged production meeting of February 12, where the coming spring sowing was discussed (chapter twenty-one); Polovtsev and Ostrovnov with the Cossacks recruited to the Union for the Emancipation of the Don (chapter twenty-seven); and Davidov, Razmyotnov, Nagulnov, Ostrovnov and Shchukar during the women’s riot and the village assembly—all scenes which illustrate the true nature of the ties between the Party and the people, and reveal the actual relationship between the Cossacks and Polovtsev and his supporters.

p The relationships between the main characters (Davidov—Nagulnov, Davidov—Ostrovnov, Razmyotnov—Nagulnov, Polovtsev—Ostrovnov, and so on) develop as an integral part of the intricate pattern of events, and are to a great extent determined by the movement of the popular masses towards collectivism and their gradual shedding of property instincts.

p In Book One the crowd scenes serve as nodal points in the plot. Each hinges onto what goes before and at the same time marks the beginning of a new chain of events. The hidden undercurrents burst to the surface in the crowd scenes, and the laws of historical action, human relations, and the characters’ natures are laid bare.

p Thus, when the meeting of village activists passes a resolution to evict the kulak families, all the events recounted in the fifth to ninth chapters are in some way connected with this decision, however indirectly.

p The basic idea behind Virgin Soil Upturned is expressed with na’ive directness and uncompromising power of feeling in Nagulnov’s account of his childhood and how he came to leave his father’s prosperous farm: “I can 237 breathe easier, dear comrade worker, now I’ve heard that we’re going to take all farming property into the collective farm. I have had a hatred of properly since I was a lad. It is the root of all evil; our learned comrades, Marx and Engels, were right" (1, 44).

p Tit Borodin, the kulak, wounds Davidov, who is carrying out the decision to evict him. Collectivisation has turned Nagulnov and Borodin, the former friends and comrades-in-arms, into implacable enemies.

p “’Makar! Remember!’ Titok shouted like a drunkard, shaking his bound hands. ’Remember! Our paths will cross! You’ve trampled on me, but next time I’ll do the same to you. I’ll kill you whatever happens. Our friendship is buried!’

p “’Get going, you counter-revolutionary!’ Nagulnov dismissed him with a wave of the hand" (1, 76).

p This episode illustrating the tragedy of a propertycorrupted man has not lost its significance as a clear warning even today. It also serves to shed light on the character of Makar Nagulnov: “The pain of it curdles your blood,” he says, referring to Tit Borodin. Yet although devoted and loyal in personal relationships, he is able to resolutely sever all bonds that tied him to property.

p As a rule the past of the heroes in Book One of Virgin Soil Upturned is presented to us without obvious digressions or suspensions in the action, in the course of the development of the basic events. The conversation between Polovtsev and Ostrovnov in chapters one and three serves to link events connected with the underground activities of the counter-revolutionaries, and also sheds light on the past of two of the leading characters. The accounts we hear from Davidov and Nagulnov of their childhood, and from Razmyotnov and Davidov about the Civil War years are also woven into the action.

p In chapter five there is an apparent “suspension”, when we are given a detailed account of Razmyotnov’s past in the form of a flash-back. But here too, his past is connected with the present through the conversation with Marina Poyarkova about the collective farm. This flashback also has an inner link with the subsequent development of the action. The dramatic moment in chapter nine when Razmyotnov says he’s not working any more (“I’m not working any more.... I’m not going to 238 dispossess anyone any more”) can only be properly understood in the light of the man’s tragic past, his short-lived happiness as a husband and father. When NaguJnov’s cold response to his empassioned outburst is “have a cry”, he exclaims: “I will cry! Perhaps my little boy...”, and breaks off (1, 78).

p The cruel drama of the time pours salt on Andrei Razmyotnov’s festering wound from the loss of his son, bringing his humanity to the surface.

p Andrei’s outburst leads Davidov to reveal his innermost feelings in turn. “You pity them. You’re sorry for them. Did they pity us? Did our enemies cry over our children’s tears?" he burst out, and there follows his impassioned account of his bitter childhood years. Then Nagulnov is able to contain himself no longer and “explodes”. “‘Swine!’ he spat out in a vibrating whisper, clenching his fists. ’Is this how you serve the Revolution? Sorry for them?’" (1, 78, 79). He then begins to writhe in one of the fits he is prone to as an after-effect of wounds received at the front.

p What an outburst of passion and suffering at this meeting between three friends and associates after a hard day’s work at the village Soviet!

p The dramatic situations in the plot of Virgin Soil Upturned give an authentic picture of a great turningpoint in the life of the people.

p The drama gradually builds up. The general meeting in chapter nine is more than the natural, inevitable outcome of the events that precede it. A middle peasant decides to join the collective farm, a decisive condition for its success. The story of Kondrat Maidannikov’s past is woven into the continuously quickening pace of events of the collectivisation: the socialisation of cattle and the eviction of the kulaks (chapter ten). The murder of the poor peasant Khoprov, who had once been with the counter-revolutionary punitive forces and who now found the courage to break with Ostrovnov and Lapshinov (chapter twelve) is connected with the historical changes taking place in the Cossack village while at the same time serving to spark off subsequent events—the decision to evict the kulak families from the region (chapter thirteen).

This decision dealt a crippling blow to the whiteguardkulak camp. Polovtsev was thrown into a violent state of 239 agitation: “They’re driving us into a corner, cutting away our last support! We must kill, kill, kill without mercy!" (1, 201).

4

p The dynamics of the plot where the sequence of events is based on real life, is calculated to probe and reveal those concrete historical conditions in which the people’s progressive cause triumphs.

p The most dramatic events during collectivisation in many villages occurred in connection with the collection of the seed funds and the beginning of the spring sowing. A decisive trial of strength took place: if the spring sowing campaign was jeopardised, the country would be left without grain the next year.

p Polovtsev sends Ostrovnov and Latyevsky a letter containing the slanderous claim that “this grain will be exported abroad and the farmers, including the collective farmers, will be condemned to cruel starvation”, and the order that it was “absolutely essential to prevent the collection of grain" (1, 216).

p A propaganda team arrives in Gremyachy Log. Such teams, usually consisting of industrial workers or employees from regional offices, were sent to the villages for short periods during collectivisation to help the local Party and Soviet organisations carry out their political and economic campaigns. As always in Sholokhov’s novels, this authentic historical fact is presented in an artistic form and is motivated by the imaginal structure of the work.

p A singularly important element in the construction of a plot is what we may term setting off characters by means of foils.

p The characters are a mobile element. When they are brought together, theylset one another off by force of contrast or similarity. The appearance of new characters on the scene^or the retirement from the action of “old” heroes is often dictated not only by the development of the action, but also by character-drawing considerations.

p The commander of the propaganda team Kondratko and the Komsomol member Ivan Naidyonov live their own, individual lives and also a “general” life, in 240 complex aesthetic relationship with the other heroes, especially with Davidov and Nagulnov.

p Both Kondratko and Naidyonov, who are essentially incidental characters, have that sharp individuality about them which is typical of all Sholokhov’s personages and which enables them here to fulfil the function of foils for the major characters of the novel.

p Kondratko is older and more experienced than Davidov. A Lugansk worker, in the Civil War he had marched “through the Cossack villages, aflame with whiteguard insurrection, to Tsaritsyn”. Now, ten years later, olderlooking and having put on a lot round the girth, Kondratko was helping to setup the collective farms in those same villages.

p With a few deft strokes Sholokhov creates a remarkably vivid picture of the old Bolshevik and Red Army veteran from recollections of the Civil War years, “whose undying echo still lives in the hearts and memories of its fighters”, a passing reference to the valour of Kondratko, the calm, quiet dignity and strength of purpose he reveals in talking with Davidov and the village Communists.

p Placed alongside Davidov, Kondratko serves to set him off, showing more clearly the features that constitute the essence of a certain type common in that epoch.

p Though men of different generations and character, Kondratko and Davidov share a common aim. Basically they both represent the same type of worker-revolutionary. What we have here is rather like a relay, with Ivan Naidyonov, the Komsomol member employed at an oil mill, taking the baton at yet another change-over.

p Typically, Sholokhov is seeing to it that before the decisive battles begin the reader is clearly aware of the forces that stand “for Davidov".

p At the same time “Old Square Sides" as Kondratko’s comrades jokingly call him, enables us to see in Davidov something that so far existed merely as a vague hint, a disturbing possibility, a danger of which he himself was as yet not fully aware....

p Davidov had refused to give any of “his” collective farm oats to feed other people’s horses, the other people being the men of a propaganda team. He “suddenly felt cold with embarrassment and disgust at himself.... 241 ‘That’s the small property-owner’s mentality! And it’s beginning to get hold of me too’, Davidov thought. ’I never felt anything of the kind before, that’s a fact! What a blighter I am!...’" (1, 198).

p Kondratko replies with the wise, sly humour of a man who was not born yesterday: “You’d make a right good farmer, you would ... mebbe even a kulak" (1, 198). This good-natured reproach is enough to make Davidov feel ashamed and put him on his guard against himself.

p It is paradoxical and unexpected to say the least, that a Communist organiser should revert to the propertyowner mentality. Yet in Book Two we see how the chairman of Tubensky collective farm moves into a kulak house and catches the “kulak spirit”, permitting hay to be lifted from another collective farm....

p Ivan Naidyonov appears in the novel at a very crucial point. The argument between Davidov and Nagulnov about what line to adopt with the Cossack masses was coming to a head.

p The peasants are not bringing in the grain for the seed fund. Nagulnov beats up Bannik for sneering at Soviet power and has several Cossacks arrested. Davidov is livid, and Razmyotnov disapproves, although “the thought stirred in his mind too: ’Maybe Makar is right after all? If we pushed them a bit harder, we’d have the whole lot in in one day!’"

p At a Party meeting Nagulnov is given a severe reprimand. As Davidov says: “You’re using the old partisan methods, but the times have changed.... Look at the new generation: our Komsomol lad from the propaganda team, Vanyusha Naidyonov, the wonderful things he’s doing!... And the ones he talks to bring in their seed without any beating up or ’solitary’, that’s a fact" (1, 231-232). Nagulnov swallows his pride and goes around with Naidyonov the next day to see how the “young one" sets about it.

p In the scene at Akim Beskhlebnov’s house Nagulnov is merely a spectator who sits there morosely, with his guarded mistrust of the “property-owner”.

p The Beskhlebnov “case” seems an impossibly difficult one for him. As he says on the way there: “You won’t move those two Akims in a hurry, they’re the tightest pair in Gremyachy. And scaring them won’t work either. Akim the younger served in the Red Army and, taking things 242 all round, lie’s a good Cossack and one of us. But he won’t bring in his grain because of his meanness and love of property" (1, 235).

p It is typical of Nagulnov that he thinks of “scaring” and “moving” the Beskhlebnovs. This was the line he would adopt in cases of difficulty. Yet to his surprise Naidyonov is behaving quite differently, showing respect for the household and being frank, forthright and straightforward.

p Naidyonov’s approach is to arouse good, human feelings in the peasants, appealing to their working Cossack instincts.

p While Nagulnov always puts himself above the masses, Naidyonov puts himself on an equal footing with them. He does not even ask himself whether the Beskhlebnovs will hand over the grain or not. He doesn’t doubt it for a moment. All he has to do is to convince them that it is necessary for the great cause of the Revolution. He tries to rouse a feeling of class solidarity, appealing to the sympathetic, open heart of the toiler.

p In this psychological duel, Naidyonov gains a decisive moral victory over Nagulnov. Yet this difficult man, severe to the point of cruelty on occasion, is pleased to recognise his defeat, and his joy shows the fine, human qualities he possesses.

p Thus Naidyonov stresses Davidov’s essential nature and at the same time rejects the repressive methods and threats against the peasants that Nagulnov uses, affirming that humanism is essential to the behaviour of the Communist manager. Naidyonov “sets off" both Davidov and Nagulnov, the former in point of likeness, the latter in point of contrast.

5

p The climax of Book One of Virgin Soil Upturned is the women’s riot (chapters thirty-three to thirty-five).

p Here again the factual basis of the plot shows through, for these riots were a typical event during collectivisation. A. Plotkin describes in his memoirs such a riot in Veshensky District. However, I feel it is unlikely that Sholokhov was basing his account purely on local 243 material. The artistic fabric of Virgin Soil Upturned is woven out of the material of numerous observations.

p In the novel these events are packed with great significance and emotional power. The conflict between old and new with all its undercurrents and everything that had slowly been building up under the surface, suddenly bursts forth into the open in a decisive battle. The chairman of the Soviet Andrei Razmyotnov is arrested, Davidov is manhandled, and the seed grain is plundered.

p But even the greatest triumph of the forces of the past—open action by some of the Gremyachy Log peasants against the collective farm—ended in their total defeat. Moreover, they were defeated without any outside help whatsoever.

p These unfortunate outbursts of violence reveal just how tight the links between the Party and the masses are, and the greatness and moral strength of Davidov, Razmyotnov and Nagulnov, ordinary people aware of the historical importance of collectivisation. The people follow them. They at last seem to accept Davidov, who has so far been an outsider, a stranger in their midst, as “one of them”. “Let’s make it up, Davidov, let bygones be bygones, eh?" a voice pipes up in a deeply moved tone at the village assembly that follows. Those that had gone astray ask to be taken back into the fold, and the spring sowing gets underway.

p Parallel with, or rather woven into the pattern of these historic events, we have the personal drama of Makar Nagulnov—the meeting of the District Committee bureau, his expulsion from the Party, and his despair and contemplation of suicide.

p Sholokhov’s plots throw the characters right out into the turbulent mainstream of history. The great flood of life seethes through his novels, carrying all before it, tearing away everything from the past that stands in its path. The life of individuals and that of the whole people at turning-points in history are merged and developed in the plot as a single current.

p The personal relationships are “hooked” to the crowd scenes, which are the turning-points in the plot. The individual and the social are interwoven and the hidden dramas of everyday family life are worked out in direct bearing to the events of collectivisation.

244

p These events_are the cause of the break-up between Andrei Razmyotnov and Marina Poyarkova. The first hint of profound disagreement comes during the conversation they have immediately after the meeting of the poor peasants.

p “’I won’t join. No matter what you say!...’

p “’Well, look out then, it’ll be good-bye’" (1, 57).

p Andrei’s threat worked. Marina joined the collective farm. But Andrei and Marina’s feelings for one another were not of the lasting sort. Later she shows her true colours, when at the time the farmers began to desert the collective farm en masse she declared that to be in the collective farm was “to go against God”. Andrei’s efforts to make her change her mind were in vain. Marina was adamant: “...I don’t want to be in the collective farm! I won’t have anything to do with your sinning!” (1, 284).

p Casual, unstable ties break up. In calmer days Nagulnov and his wife might have dragged on their marriage indefinitely without things coming to a head.

p When her lover Timofei the Torn had left the village with the other kulaks and their families “she had shrieked hysterically and thrown herself down in the snow".

p That had been the last straw for Makar and he had told her to prepare to leave. “I’ve known a lot of shame loving you, but you’ve reached the end of my patience! You got tangled up with that son of a kulak—I didn’t say anything. But when it comes to wailing out loud before all the class-conscious collective-farm people—my patience won’t stand any more! With a woman like you around I’ll never live to see the World Revolution, and I may go off the rails altogether. You’re just a burden to me in life. Well, I’m chucking that burden off. Understand?” (1, 143).

p Contemporary reality can only be properly understood in the light of its significance in the history of human society and its influence on the intrinsic essence of human nature and individual destinies.

It is just this awareness of the laws of history that accounts for the social optimism of Sholokhov’s novels, which are a powerful poetic affirmation of the ceaseless advance of history. This is why we must reckon with Sholokhov’s novels “as reality itself".

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6

p An important feature of Book One of Virgin Soil Upturned as regards composition and style is the continual contrasting of day and night, and the parallel drawn between the approach of spring and the movement of the Gremyachy Log peasants to join the collective farm.

p Virgin Soil Upturned tells of people who have freed themselves once and for all from the crippling, stifling influence of private-property instincts. It tells not of the individual, but of the peasant masses in their millions who have forever renounced their fettering privateproperty mentality.

p Our awareness of the importance of the changes taking place, our impatience for the complete triumph of the new order that will free man for creative labour, is strengthened by the ardent anticipation of spring and hot, fruitful summer that is present throughout. This theme runs through the book like a captivating and subtle musical melody. We have a few bars in the description of the countryside in the very first chapter and then it is lost in the turbulent torrent of events to come up here and there until it once again bursts forth loud and clear in the descriptions of spring, the exciting scenes of the socialist competition in Lyubishkin’s team at the ploughing and sowing, the blessed rain after which everything was green and burgeoned in the collective-farm fields.

p The countryside plays an important aesthetic and compositional role in Virgin Soil Upturned. Like the first stream to cut its path through the melting snow, the descriptions of the countryside carry the reader headlong towards spring, constantly turning his thoughts to it. It is not calm and silence that emanates from these descriptions but irrepressible elan.

p Compare these two passages. “The cherry orchards smell good after the first thaw at the end of January. In sheltered parts at noon (if there is any warmth in the sun) the faint melancholy smell of cherry bark mingles with the vapid dampness of melted snow, with the powerful and ancient odour of the earth just beginning to appear from under the snow and the dead leaves of the previous autumn" (1, 7).

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p “February.

p “The earth is crushed and wrenched by the cold. The sun rises in a white glare of frost. Where the winds have licked away the snow, the earth cracks loudly at night. The mounds in the steppe arc furrowed like overripe water-melons with snake-like rifts. Outside the village, on the autumn-ploughed land the snow-drifts shine dazzlingly, unbearably bright. The poplars along the stream are engraved in silver. Orange columns of smoke rise straight as building timber from the village chimneys of a morning. And on the threshing floors the wheat straw smells even stronger of golden August, of hot dry winds, of the summer sky" (1, 127-128).

p While in January the only hints of distant spring are the faint fragrance of the cherry bark and the damp smell of the earth beginning to appear from under the melted snow, in February the strong smell of wheat straw carries us across the months, making “golden August" and “hot dry winds" an almost tangible presence. Despite the cold which makes the earth cringe summer seems just around the corner. Sholokhov purposely mentions August, the fruitful month when the harvest is gathered in and the results of man’s labour are everywhere visible.

p In Virgin Soil Upturned the descriptions of nature figure neither as a background, nor as pantheistic studies, complete in themselves, but are an inseparable part of the events described, giving the reader a feeling of suspense and anticipation of great and wonderful things to come and helping him sense the grandeur of what is taking place.

p One of the most important places in the novel for the wealth of meaning and emotion it carries is the description of the night (chapter twelve) following the account of the distribution of confiscated kulak clothing. The poorest of the village poor, “their dark faces brightening with trembling hesitant smiles, hurriedly crumpled up their old patched and repatched garments and donned new outfits through which their flesh no longer showed" (1, 161).

p It is more than a question of people, many of whom had never worn decent clothing in their lives, receiving the good-quality kulak articles. Poverty was being banished for ever from the Cossack village to become but a bitter memory of the past, and as Kondrat Maidannikov 247 tosses and turns, unable to sleep, he has a vision of Moscow at night.

p “Separated from Gremyachy Log by a thousand miles, great Moscow, city of our fathers, lives even at night. Engine whistles call out loud and long, motor horns sound like the chords of a huge accordion, tramcars clang. And behind the tomb of Lenin, behind the Kremlin wall, borne up on a cold blustering wind, a red flag flutters in the glowing sky. Lighted from below by the white glare of electric light, it blazes and streams like flowing scarlet blood. Its heavy folds droop for a minute and then the strong wind lifts it and whirls it about, and again it flutters and flaps, pointing now west, now east, blazing with the purple flame of rebellion, and summoning to the struggle....” (1, 166-167).

p This epic vision of Moscow and the red flag “blazing with the purple flame of rebellion, and summoning to the struggle”, throws into relief the great importance of the events taking place in a far-off Don village, by drawing them into the broad mainstream of historical development.

p The epoch as a whole and events in Gremyachy Log are qualitatively related. This is a fine example of the epic sweep of the novel. Sholokhov has managed to give poetic expression to the relationship between what took place at Gremyachy Log and the world at large.

p The description of the still winter night at Gremyachy Log which follows is in sharp contrast to the morning stir, when “the Moscow wind" blows on the village from the north, the wind of ceaseless movement forward, and of restless endeavour for improvement and the happiness of mankind.

p At the first formal meeting ever held in the village, Ippolit Shaly the blacksmith is rewarded “for his really excellent work, which every member of the farm should try to equal”. The scene of the presentation ceremony follows hard on a description of the coming of spring to Gremyachy Log; rapidly melting snow, upland waters pouring down to the lowlands in countless stream, which overflowed their banks, flooding orchards, “and the luring call of a wedge-shaped flight of cranes breasting the intense blue of cloudless skies”. As usual, Sholokhov gives a very concrete picture of nature’s re-awakening. 248 “A heat haze flows and trembles over the mounds; a blade of grass forces its sharp green sting through the dead stubble of the previous year and reaches up to the sun. The wind-dried winter rye seems to be standing on tiptoe to offer its leaves to the light-bearing rays" (1, 243).

p The whole scene of nature bathed in light with all living things stretching up with longing towards the sun is a poetic prelude to the description of people finding happiness in working for the good of the community, and beginning to learn the value and significance of that work.

p Ippolit Shaly, “who had never been spoiled with overmuch attention, and had never in his life made a lengthy speech, and whose only reward for his work had been a glass of vodka now and again from one of the villagers, was quite knocked out of his usual balanced state of mind by the management’s gift and the impressive circumstances attending its presentation" (1, 245). He was at a loss for words. A clamour of voices arose. The collective farmers, who had so recently been individual peasants, shouted words of encouragement and friendly jokes. They were proud of him, and happy for him. In this short, humourous scene Sholokhov captures admirably the feelings of the man who for the first time in his life transfers his attention from his own little acre to the world at large and for the first time in his wretched life feels respect for his neighbour not because of his business acumen and wealth, but for his conscientiousness and work.

p Andrei Razmyotnov, who was the master-of-ceremonies, had quite a job bringing the meeting to order: “Cool down a bit there! What are you yelling about again? Feeling the spring?" (1, 245).

p Razmyotnov has accidentally hit the nail on the head. The villagers are really feeling the spring, which has caught them up in its flood-waters and is carrying them towards a life quite different from the miserable existence they have hitherto known.

p Ippolit Shaly finally plucks up the courage to speak. He ends his stumbling, faltering speech: “Thank you, Comrade Davidov and the collective farm ... thank you very much!" (1, 246). These simple words straight from the heart express better than any others just what he felt—and with him the majority of farmers present at the meeting.

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The end of Book One contains the seeds of new conflicts and betokens new class battles. Timofei the Torn, son of an exiled kulak, returns to his native parts; and Polovlsev and Latyevsky turn up again at Ostrovnov’s house as foreign agents.

7

p Until such time as the draft versions of Book Two become available it will be impossible to form a complete picture of the book in the process of writing, as one of the main points requiring our attention is the actual subject-matter of the novel.

p The rough notes for Book Two were apparently made in 1932 right after work on Book One. Sholokhov expected to finish Virgin Soil Upturned at the same time as book four of And Quiet Flows the Don, if not before. However, he was forced to put aside his writing for some time, due to the difficult situation that arose on the Don in 1932-1933.

p In a conversation with a reporter from Literaturnaya Gazeta in 1934, Sholokhov made a clear statement to the effect that work on And Quiet Flows the Don kept him from completing Virgin Soil Upturned. His exact words were: “Work on the last book of And Quiet Flows the Don has prevented me from finishing Book Two of Virgin Soil Upturned.... As soon as I finish And Quiet Flows the Don I shall get back to Virgin Soil Upturned."

p In the same interview Sholokhov speaks of the time of the action of Book Two and the heroes.

p “I have now overcome the main difficulty which slowed down work on part one—the abundance of material and my efforts to choose what was most essential. Book Two, like Book One, will show the establishment of the collective-farm system in the countryside. It covers roughly the same period (1930-1931), but a later stage. All the main characters in Book One are carried over into Book Two, but in addition to them the reader will also meet new heroes. These are mainly Party workers from the district.”

p He then went on to say how he intended taking certain criticisms into account in Book Two. “I accept the criticism that in the first book of Virgin Soil the role of the 250 Komsomol in the collectivisation of the countryside is poorly reflected and that women activists are not shown at all. This shortcoming must be corrected in the work plan for Book Two. As to how, I don’t know yet.”  [250•* 

p In a conversation with an Izvestia correspondent a year later, Sholokhov again confirmed the period of time the action of Book Two would probably cover: “Book Two will also be the last. It covers 1931, the period during which the collective farms were well and truly established.” The arrangement of the key figures was to be the same as in Book One.

p “The figure of the middle peasant joining the collective farm will be the central theme as before, despite the fact that this imposes certain limitations on the development of events__ The trio with Davidov at the head remains, Grandad Shchukar will not, I hope, lose all his joviality, and the people from the district offices will become more intelligent and cultured. Polovtsev and Timofei will join a small renegade band.... I want Book Two, like Book One, to be a novel of everyday life. There’s a peculiar vigour and fascination in collectivefarm life.... Everyday life needs describing and it’s an honour to do it!"  [250•** 

p Judging from the final version, Sholokhov’s plans underwent some quite considerable changes. Kondrat Maidannikov, “a middle farmer joining the collective farm”, has definitely passed into the background and becomes no more than an incidental figure. Nor was this, obviously, dictated by fears of “certain limitations on the development of events”. The truth is that the social and psychological content of Kondrat Maidannikov was practically exhausted in Book One (his break with the past, overcoming of his hankering after what was “his own" and so on). All the events in Book One lead up to the moment when he joins the Party, which marks his civic coming of age.

p It was thus quite natural that he should fade into the background in Book Two. Other characters—like Ippolit Shaly, Ustin Rikalin and Ivan Arzhanov—are brought into the foreground. Each of them has his past filled 251 in with a fair degree of detail, thus historical perspective is created, and one is given a strong feeling of the passage from the old days to the new life. The laws of history are more consistently manifest here than in Book One.

p Sholokhov completely changed the fate of Polovtsev and Timofei the Torn, finding a much more dynamic solution. The scene where Nagulnov kills Timofei is one of the most powerful in the whole novel. Here is such a wealth of tragic motives as one could hardly have expected to find if Sholokhov had followed his original intention of having Timofei meet Polovtsev, describing how the band was formed, and so on. Timofei’s feelings come to the fore and determine the outcome of events: he feels he must see Lushka, and tries to meet her. He fires at Nagulnov, and all his class hatred, memories of former injuries, and bitter jealousy mixed up together go into that shot....

p It is interesting to note what became of Sholokhov’s plan to show the people from the district offices much more clearly in Book Two. During the thirties Sholokhov was bound by close ties of friendship with many of the Party and Soviet workers in Veshensky District, and he took everything that happened in the district very much to heart. He took part in all the sowing and harvesting campaigns and so on. Sholokhov’s creative work was closely linked to work for the Party and the Government.

p Men like P. Lugovoi, P. Krasyukov and T. Logachev did not only meet Sholokhov on “business”. There were the hunting and fishing outings, gatherings at Sholokhov’s house, such as the gay New Year celebrations, when the children would have to solve verse riddles composed by the writer himself and the grown-ups would sing folk songs, and laugh and joke together.

p An Izvestia correspondent wrote in 1935: “Sholokhov is obviously very much wrapped up in this type at present, he feels he has a debt to pay the district men. He is continually comparing them with the average intellectual in the West, and marvelling at the integrity, thirst for knowledge, and clarity of purpose and outlook of the people who are leading tho districts forward.

p “‘Writers, myself included,’ he says frankly, ’have a debt of gratitude too great to be repaid to these 252 remarkable people who are so quickly acquiring knowledge and culture in the widest sense of the word.’"  [252•* 

p Sholokhov “paid off the debt" with Nesterenko, the Secretary of the District Party Committee, in Book Two of Virgin Soil Upturned.

p One cannot help wondering whether Sholokhov had intended writing of the gross distortions in the policy of collectivisation which had such tragic consequences in 1932 and 1933. That is a question that cannot be answered without the help of the author.

p Almost every mention Sholokhov made of his plans which we know of, shows that he had no avowed intention of continuing the action beyond 1931. In the final published manuscript, indeed, the events do not take us beyond 1930.

p As the tight mainspring of the action unwinds, it becomes clear that the author’s main attention is focussed on the events and historical significance of the beginnings of collectivisation.

p Be that as it may, however, like any true work of art, Sholokhov’s book transcends the bounds of the time in which it is set and is a valid comment on many questions of our whole age.

p Book Two of Virgin Soil Upturned is by no means an impassive chronicle of events that are over and done with. Although it deals with events far removed in time, it is permeated with the spirit of today. Indeed, Sholokhov was able to see much of what he described all the more clearly for viewing it from the vantage point of a later day.

p Since the development of the action is determined by the active influence the Communists exert on the social processes it is only natural that Davidov, Razmyotnov and Nagulnov should occupy the centre of the stage.

p Rather than ignore the humdrum and everyday aspects of reality Sholokhov draws strength from them. His artistic vision has an immeasurable range. He sees how some men are ennobled by their awareness of the historical aims of society and by working for their attainment, while others are the slaves of the small property-owner mentality and this leads them to moral degradation.

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p He sees how the shoots of the new struggle up in every sphere of human feelings, even the most eternal and intimate.

p If in Book One the poetry of social transformation rings out loud and clear in a jubilant key, Book Two strikes a more lyrical note with the moral education of the man for whom the future was opening up.

p The social theme often appears in Book Two as an intrinsic part of the moral element.

p Hence such features of the plot as deceleration of the action, numerous “confessions” full of hidden meaning (Ivan Arzhanov’s confession and advice to Davidov to think about the “kinks” in human nature), lengthy conversations (Ippolit Shaly and Davidov, Nesterenko and Davidov and so on), increased interest in relationships which reveal the more intimate side of human nature (Davidov—Lushka—Varya Kharlamova; and Nagulnov—Lushka).

p The author’s “tone” has changed considerably. Whereas in Book One he only addressed the reader directly once, in Book Two his own attitude makes itself felt on numerous occasions and he openly projects himself into the world of his heroes as a sympathetic friend. The lyricism of the language gives a very special note of sincerity and intimacy to the narrative.

p The author’s feeling suddenly bursts into the hitherto objective account of Varya and Davidov’s ill-starred love: “What are you crying for, dear?" (2, 93); “Poor little ox-driver, only seventeen years old!" (2, 98).

p This tender note of sympathy on the author’s part is often present in accounts of Davidov and Razmyotnov, and builds up to the moving requiem for Nagulnov and Davidov at the end of the book.

p “...And so the nightingales of the Don have sung farewell to my dearly cherished Davidov and Nagulnov, the ripening wheat has whispered it, the pebbles of the nameless stream that flows from somewhere at the top of the Gremyachy ravine have murmured it. And now it is all over" (2, 456).

p This requiem born of the writer’s love and sympathy for his heroes arouses a strong note of response in the reader, making him feel the loss as a personal one.

254

p The strong lyric element already observable in the later parts of And Quiet Flows the Don is typical of almost all Sholokhov’s post-war works. In fact, the prominence of the subjective element in epic narrative is a typical feature of modern prose. It takes the form of lyricism, and is also manifest in the changed character of the period, the bold combinations of various kinds of speech (narration by the author, the heroes, represented direct and so on), and in the wide use made of represented direct speech, which permits the author to subtly introduce his own standpoint into even the most intimate thoughts and experiences of his heroes.

p Throughout Book Two Sholokhov debates such subjects as true humanity, humanism and historical necessity.

p The actions of Semyon Davidov, Makar Nagulnov and Andrei Razmyotnov are determined by their aspirations for their cherished ideal of socialism, which for them was a dream of new social relations coming true. These men were free from slavish attachment to “cursed property”, their land and their chattels.

p The humanistic ardour in Virgin Soil Upturned indeed arises from this rejection of that world of unbridled property instincts where class egoism withered the human spirit.

p The struggle for socialism brings out the best qualities in any Sholokhov hero—that is, his personal concern for the common weal and his social consciousness.

Virgin Soil Upturned is not only orientated towards the present day. The high ideals it is imbued with make it a bridge to the future.