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The Gulag Archipelago

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The Gulag Archipelago

By: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Narrated by: Jordan B. Peterson, Ignat Solzhenitsyn
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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

The audiobook edition of The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, read by the author's son, Ignat Solzhenitsyn.

With a new foreword written and read by Jordan B. Peterson, and an exclusive Q&A between Jordan B. Peterson and Ignat Solzhenitsyn.

The officially approved abridgement of The Gulag Archipelago Volumes I, II & III.

A vast canvas of camps, prisons, transit centres and secret police, of informers and spies and interrogators but also of everyday heroism, The Gulag Archipelago is Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's grand masterwork. Based on the testimony of some 200 survivors, and on the recollection of Solzhenitsyn's own 11 years in labour camps and exile, it chronicles the story of those at the heart of the Soviet Union who opposed Stalin, and for whom the key to survival lay not in hope but in despair.

A thoroughly researched document and a feat of literary and imaginative power, this edition of The Gulag Archipelago was abridged into one volume at the author's wish and with his full co-operation.

©2019 Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (P)2019 Penguin Audio Freedom & Security Military & War Political Science Politics & Government Russia Soviet Union War Military Thought-Provoking Survival Scary Stalin Inspiring Human Rights Imperialism

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Critic reviews

"Solzhenitsyn’s masterpiece.... The Gulag Archipelago helped create the world we live in today." (Anne Applebaum)

"[The Gulag Archipelago] helped to bring down an empire. Its importance can hardly be exaggerated." (Doris Lessing, Sunday Telegraph)
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The fact this book exisits is a miracle! Perfectly narrated by Ignat. Jordans foreword was also incredibly powerful and does the book justice. I would highly recommend this book.

Profoundly deep

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Everyone should experience this account of the terror and aggravation that the people of the gulag experienced.
The narrator dances through the reading with style and personality.
A truly fascinating book.

Remarkable book and a sublime performance.

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I stuggle to understand how we have seemed to have forgot these tragic event and how beautifully written the sad, death ridden Soviet Union was under Stalin. The brief talk at the end is perfect to sum up what this book means and how we can move forward. A must read. A must listen.

Eye opening

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Solzhenitsyn’s magnum opus reveals the lives of people hauled through the depths of hell.

The author picks apart the inexhaustible and creative evil that mankind is capable of, given the fatalistic excuse of a wretched ideology.

I am convinced that this audiobook has changed my perspective on Marxism, and has left me in contempt against the dangers of ideological possession.

A Glimpse Into The Unbounded Malevolence Of Man

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Loved it
A real true adventure with great narration
Testing these men to the most extreme elements that nature could throw at them.

Great Detail

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Profound and moving book. While having Solzhenitsyn's son narrate it added a touching undercurrent, I'd have preferred the more animated and emotive narration of Jordan Peterson, particularly given the subject matter.

An important book.

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Covering Solzhenitsyn's time in the Gulag and full of first and second hand accounts which are backed up with data and what press releases could be found in the Soviet system the book is unlike any other I've read a combination of history, memoir, philosophy, religion and investigative reporting.

Composed through immense difficulty, Solzhenitsyn speaks about memorising by rote 12000 lines of his book in the gulag, where writing it down would have been foolish, and using a 50 bead rosary to practice it.

With the description of the dehumanising system of exploitation (that he's estimates cannot have been profitable economically for the state) where the death rates could be as high as 1% per day and survival at all costs meant at the cost of other's lives "you die today, I'll die tomorrow" the book contains an optimistic view of what may happen, the human spirit and the capacity to grow in adverse situations.

The paranoia of Stalin and the party is palpable through the actions of constantly higher quotas for arrested "politicals" the 58s, named after the political article in the criminal code. This includes not only arrest and hard labour for being denounced (by one enemy or by your husband's mistress) but a whole office for one act of graffiti, or the prisoners of war (how POWs can be traitors is rhetorically asked). And the Organs (how the secret police NKVD or blue caps describe themselves) have to continually raise quotas in order to justify their existence.

There's a foreword by Jordan Peterson that's a bit out of place, an abridgement should make the work shorter and increasing the length with Peterson's interpretation (that the book is solely about how bad communism is and always will be) it's a gross oversimplification at best and an attempt to score political points at worst, expanding outside of Russia to Venezuela and other communist system to rant about the evils of any ideology "not born out of religion" is not supported by the text, Solzhenitsyn himself states "let any reader who thinks this us a political expose slam its covers shut". I'd suggest skipping this section to move onto the less opinionated foreword of the editor and Solzhenitsyn's collaborator on the Abridgement.

Solzhenitsyn made it his life's work to publicise the atrocities and ensure that no matter the censors' erasures or people's cries not to "open old wounds" (the wounds mostly being inflicted by them) the Russian people would know at least part of the gulag truth.

Bleak look at the worst sides of human nature

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masterly
the real horror of this book is the observation that we could so easily be them. how then will you deal with this reality (sin) in your own life?

the antagonism between Marxism and authentic Christianity (ie not much of what you see in the West today) is because Marxism is a counterfeit reality and in Christianity it is confronted with absolute truth - as Solzenitsin knew. We are seeing this struggle playing out again in our own time in global elitism and it's growing structures and laws (interestingly it owes much to Carl Jung, who seems to be much respected by Mr Peterson)

counterfeit Vs real

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We hear so much (and rightly so) about the horrors of Naziism these days and very little about the horrors of Communism. There are dangers in both extremes and this books shows very clearly the consequences of communistic ideology.

Needs to be heard!

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This book will always be important. Sadly, its lessons on life will always need to be learnt.

An important look into the darkest part of history

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