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Gustaw Herling's A World Apart is one of the most important books about Soviet camps and communist ideology in the Stalinist period. First published in English in 1951 and translated into many languages, it was relatively unknown till Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago in the 1970s. However, the narrative of the author's experience in the Jertsevo gulag was highly appreciated by Bertrand Russell, Albert Camus, Jorge Semprun and others. In this first monograph on Herling's fascinating life, Bolecki discusses hitherto unknown documents from the writer's archive in Naples. His insight into the subject and poetics of Herling's book and the account of its remarkable reception offer readers an intriguing profile of one of the most compelling witnesses of the 20th century.
List of contents
Contents: Gustaw Herling - Soviet concentration camps - Communist ideology - Stalinist period - Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago - Jertsevo gulag - Bertrand Russell, Albert Camus, Jorge Semprun.
About the author
W¿odzimierz Bolecki is professor at the Institute of Literary Research at the Polish Academy of Sciences and Humanities in Warsaw. An expert in literary criticism and history, he focuses primarily on modern fiction and the poetics and methodology of literary studies. He is the chief editor of Gustaw Herling¿s collected works and the author of publications on Mi¿osz, Witkacy, Gombrowicz and other Polish writers.
