The main protagonist is one Oleg Kostoglotov, who bears some resemblance to Solzhenitsyn, in that he was a soldier in the Soviet army during World War II, was arrested and sentenced to the labor camps for the crime of criticizing Stalin, was sentenced to 'perpetual exile' in a remote part of the Soviet Union, contracted cancer and was treated in the cancer ward of a hospital somewhere in Central Asia. It is a powerful meditation on what it means to be truly human and features an eclectic cast of characters, medical staff as well as patients, and Solzhenitsyn portrays his characters with a skill and sympathy (where warranted) that make this a beautiful and moving novel. It is to some degree informed by the author's own experience as a cancer patient following eight years in a labor camp and in the midst of what turned out to be three years' internal exile. In any event one of the features of growing old is that you can pick up a book you read forty years ago and it is a brand new experience.Ĭancer Ward is set in the mid 1950's in the era of the 'Thaw' that was initiated and short lived following the death of Stalin in 1953. Nowadays if I happen to mention that I'm reading a novel by Solzhenitsyn I can be pretty certain of getting a blank stare by way of a response.

I originally purchased and read Cancer Ward back in 1980 when most educated Westerners would have known who the author was if not the story of his life and works.

Cancer ward by alexander solzhenitsyn