Shapovalov Veronica - Remembering the Darkness

Remembering the Darkness

Remembering the Darkness

Women in Soviet Prisons

Edited and Translated by Veronica Shapovalov

ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.

Published in the United States of America
by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.

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www.rowmanlittlefield.com

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Copyright 2001 by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Information Available

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Remembering the darkness: women in Soviet prisons / edited and translated by Veronica Shapovalov.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN: 978-0-7425-1146-0

1. Women political prisonersSoviet UnionBiography. 2. Women political prisonersSoviet Union. 3. Concentration campsSoviet Union. 4. Penal coloniesSoviet Union. I. Title: Women in Soviet prisons. II. Shapovalov, Veronica.

HV9712.5 .R4 2001

365'.45'082092247dc21

[B]

2001020453

Printed in the United States of America

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

This book would not be possible without the invaluable assistance of Irina Flige and Veniamin Iofe from the St. Petersburg Memorial who provided me with access to memoirs and much more.

Preface

All of the memoirs and letters presented in this collection came from the archives of Memorial (St. Petersburg)an organization formed in 1991 to conduct research on the history of political repression in the Soviet Union. None were written with the intent of publication, and their authors are not professional writers. Most of the manuscripts were edited in Russian prior to translation so as to avoid repetitions, inconsistencies, and digressions irrelevant to the main narrative. It was my goal in editing to carry through the intention of each narrative by preserving as much as possible the authors unique voices, perceptions, attitudes, and motivations, while eliminating infelicities of style and grammar common to impromptu speech and writing. In longer manuscripts, I occasionally made the difficult choice of deleting sections that did not have direct bearing on the main themes of the collection: resistance to the totalitarian system, everyday life in womens barracks, and problems unique to women.

The biographical notes about the authors vary in length but generally offer all the information available. These notes identify persons and places, specific events, and numerical data relevant to each respective text. Their intent is to provide a point of reference for the reader and a context for assessing the uniqueness or commonality of these womens experiences.

The Library of Congress transliteration system was used, but diacriticals were omitted. The images on pages 277, 293, and 302 are from my family. All of the others are from Memorial.

Acknowledgments

I would like to profusely thank everybody who helped me bring this book to life. My sincere gratitude to Tatiana Morgacheva of St. Petersburg Memorial for her assistance in getting photos, typing, and copying.

I cannot thank my friend Rebecca Ritke enough for her encouragement, advice, and invaluable help in reading over and over again what I each time thought would be the final version.

I want to thank Galina Lokshin of the University of Illinois Library and George Durman of Bayonne Public Library for their help in research and their ability to find the answers to the most difficult questions.

I am grateful to Marcelline Hutton, Marcia Perez, Tania Wolfson, Jan Plamper, and Moira McGrain for reading the first draft of the manuscript and providing comments. Special thanks to Tania Wolfson for help in translating Anna Zborovskaias poems.

I am indebted to the College of Arts and Letters at San Diego State University for the research grant to complete my work at St. Petersburg Memorial. I want to thank my students at San Diego State University for their comments and insights on womens prison memoirs.

The patience, enthusiasm, and goodwill of Susan McEachern and the editorial staff of Roman & Littlefield made the book possible.

Most of all I am grateful to Inna for being a source of inspiration, support, humor, and understanding.

And last, but not least, thanks to Boris for listening.

Introduction

became an infamous symbol of the Soviet totalitarian policy of terror known in Russian as political repression (represiia). Special camps and prison barracks for women were part of the Glavnoe up-ravlenie lagerei (gulag) system.

The documents excerpted and reproduced in this collection point to areas of Soviet history and culture that have received little investigation. These womens narrations are about friendship, work, hope, inspiration, loss, and terror. Why did the women write about their experiences? Why did they talk about them? Before their release from camp or prison, convicts were made to sign a document (podpiska o nerazglashenii) stating that they would never disclose any information about places of confinement, and any violation of this rule was punishable by deprivation of freedom for three years. Yet, many were compelled to write. Keeping a personal journal was an ingrained habit of many educated women in Russia. These journals were not intended for publication, but sometimes they turned into a coherent life story. In fear of repression, some women wrote their memoirs under pen names. After the end of the Soviet regime, the publication and public discussion of previously unknown documents about political repression prompted people to tell their stories. They wrote to Memorialan organization formed in 1991 to conduct research on political repression in the Soviet Union. Many, who for some reason did not want to write about their experiences, readily spoke with Memorial interviewers.

Women wrote their life stories even in campsa few of these documents were preserved by the camp administration as part these womens personal case files. The totalitarian state had tried to do everything to strip the prisoners of their identitiesmorally and literally: In hard-labor camps, women had to wear patches of cloth, like badges, with numbers on their chest, back, and kerchiefs. In prisons, guards often called inmates only by the first letter of the last names (Whos M? Step out!). For those women prisoners whose crimes were strictly imaginary and made real by articles of the Soviet criminal code, the investigators and interrogators created a criminal biography and tried to make their victims believe in it. Writing was one of the ways to preserve self-identity and dignity.

Personal accounts are historical testimonies. That does not mean that their factual accuracy is beyond doubt; they contain discrepancies in details such as dates, locations, and numbers. Moreover, personal accounts are subjective, biased, and distorted by self-censorship and by individual and collective perceptions of the past and present. However, these very idiosyncrasies can be most revealing to readers who are interested in the point of view and scope of vision of the individual memoirists, as well as in the human meaning of their experience of the gulag.