University of Virginia Library

Prof. Nils A. Nilsson

Russian Author Solzhneitsyn...
The Epitome Of His Characters

By BARBARA BROWNELL

"Solzhneitsyn may be
compared with his character
Ivan Denisovich in that he
worked in the most difficult of
positions with the worst of
tools," commented Swedish
Prof. Nils A. Nilsson in a
lecture comparing nineteenth
and twentieth century
Russian authors at Wilson Hall
yesterday.

Wrote In Dull Era

"Solzhneitsyn; who wrote
during the dull and alienated
Stalin era, had as great a
difficulty finding means to
express himself with limited
knowledge of modern literary
style as his character had
finding contentment with a
limited selection of post-prison
occupations," said Mr. Nilsson,
president of Slavic Literature
and International Dostoevsky
Associations, and head of
Columbia University's Russian
Research Institute.

Citing differences between
Russian novelists in his past
studies, Mr. Nilsson told his
audience that Tolstoy's and
Dostoevsky's novels of Russian
Realism are less narrative and
more colorful than
Sozhneitsyn's depictions of the
Stalin era.

"Solzhneitsyn's twentieth
century novel, One Day in the
Life of Ivan Denisavich, is an
attempt to break away from the
dull, colorless literature forced

by this time period," he said.
The novel's life, colloquialism
and four-letter words shocked
some readers, but were the
keys to maximum clarity."

"Although this work may
be described as one of
Solzhneitsyn's 'more
interesting and excellent
novels';" Mr. Nilsson added,
"it strays from the more
picturesque style of the 1800's
in that the fiction is blended
with a documentary which
tends to be archaic and clumsy
because the language is stark,
structured, and alienated as a
result of Russia's lack of
contact with the modern world
since Stalin's regime."

"The realistic and
internationally oriented works
of the 19th century were
composed of epic style and
psychological structure, their
material being experienced in a
more intense and personal
manner than that of the