Young heroes of the Soviet Union /
Material type: TextPublisher: New York : Random House, [2020]Copyright date: 2020Edition: First editionDescription: 289 pagesContent type:- text
- unmediated
- volume
- 9781400067060
- 1400067065
- 305.892/4047092 B 23
- DS134.93.H35 A3 2020
Item type | Current library | Home library | Collection | Call number | Copy number | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Standard Loan | Coeur d'Alene Library Adult Biography | Coeur d'Alene Library | Book | B HALBERS HALBERS (Browse shelf(Opens below)) | 1 | Available | 50610021818864 | |||
Standard Loan | Hayden Library Adult Biography | Hayden Library | Book | HALBERS-HALBERS (Browse shelf(Opens below)) | 1 | Available | 50610022325208 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
In this "urgent and enthralling reckoning with family and history" (Andrew Solomon), an American writer returns to Russia to face a past that still haunts him.
NAMED ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES CRITICS' TOP BOOKS OF THE YEAR
Alex Halberstadt's quest takes him across the troubled, enigmatic land of his birth, where decades of Soviet totalitarianism shaped and fractured three generations of his family. In Ukraine, he tracks down his paternal grandfather--most likely the last living bodyguard of Joseph Stalin. He revisits Lithuania, his Jewish mother's home, to examine the legacy of the Holocaust and the pernicious anti-Semitism that remains largely unaccounted for. And he returns to his birthplace, Moscow, where his grandmother designed homespun couture for Soviet ministers' wives, his mother consoled dissidents at a psychiatric hospital, and his father made a dangerous living by selling black-market American records. Halberstadt also explores his own story: that of an immigrant growing up in New York, another in a line of sons separated from their fathers by the tides of politics and history.
Young Heroes of the Soviet Union is a moving investigation into the fragile boundary between history and biography. As Halberstadt revisits the sites of his family's formative traumas, he uncovers a multigenerational transmission of fear, suffering, and rage. And he comes to realize something more: Nations, like people, possess formative traumas that penetrate into the most private recesses of their citizens' lives.
The forgotten -- The bodyguard -- Number 19 -- The motherland calls -- Camp success.
Table of contents provided by Syndetics
- Family Trees (p. x)
- Prologue: The Forgotten (p. xiii)
- 1 The Bodyguard (p. 1)
- 2 Number 19 (p. 73)
- 3 The Motherland Calls (p. 161)
- Epilogue: Camp Success (p. 257)
- Acknowledgments (p. 287)
- Photo Credits (p. 291)
Excerpt provided by Syndetics
Reviews provided by Syndetics
Library Journal Review
In the ultimate act of self-retrospection, Halberstadt (Lonely Avenue) investigates his identity by traveling to Russia, his country of birth, to interview family and document the horrifying effects of the world wars. When the author learns that his grandfather is alive, but ostracized because of "unmentionable things" committed as a personal bodyguard of Joseph Stalin, Haberstadt develops a project to uncover secret histories and their reverberation through the generations. Traveling through Russia and Lithuania, Halberstadt visits his father, grandparents, and other distant relatives. The history of Jewish relatives in Lithuania suffering waves of pogroms is contrasted against his paternal grandfather's conscription into the Soviet army and service for Stalin. Such a personal history stands apart from other titles because, although the journey is framed as a family narrative, historically detailed episodes are impressively illuminated. Particularly commendable is the archival research on Vilnius, Lithuania's capital. VERDICT An impeccably executed and unique genealogy that encourages us to examine the history that informs us of who we are.--Jessica Bushore, Xenia, OHPublishers Weekly Review
Russian-American journalist Halberstadt (Lonely Avenue) travels to Russia to better understand his family's complicated legacy in this illuminating but dense memoir. The author vividly describes his travels to far-flung corners of the former Soviet Union, most evocatively his trip to Vinnytsia, Ukraine, to track down his grandfather Vassily, who tells him how he worked as a bodyguard to Joseph Stalin and recounts standing guard at government banquets as well as witnessing mass rape during the deportation of the ethnic Tatars in 1944. Halberstadt's fishing trip along the Volga River with his estranged father is another emotional highlight, and in detailing the life of his mother--a Lithuanian Jew--he gives an enlightening primer on the genocide in Lithuania, though the history of his extended family becomes bogged down in detail. In the final chapters, the author shares stories from his childhood as an immigrant in 1980s Queens, showing how he navigated prejudice while becoming at ease with his homosexuality. Halberstadt is at his best when writing about his own youth, and his interviews with family members are affecting. Readers who can stick with this when it gets into the genealogical weeds will find much to appreciate in this insightful and moving narrative. (Mar.)Author notes provided by Syndetics
Alex Halberstadt is the author of the award-winning Lonely Avenue: The Unlikely Life and Times of Doc Pomus . His writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Travel + Leisure, GQ, Saveur, and The Paris Review . He is a two-time James Beard Award nominee and a recipient of fellowships from the MacDowell Colony and Yaddo. He was educated at Oberlin College and Columbia University, and works and lives in New York.There are no comments on this title.