A haunting literary and visual journey deep into Russia's past - and present.
Gessen travels to the far reaches of Siberia to discover what remains of the Gulags - the dreadful work camps that begun under Stalin that existed for decades. Friedman provides a poignant photographic essay of their journey too.
“Under Putin—whose motto might as well be ‘Make Russia Great Again’—Stalin’s rule is now remembered as a time of glory and order.... It is a grim reminder that once again, as in the 1930s, all over the world authoritarian strongmen are riding high.”
—Adam Hochschild, The New York Times Book Review“A short, haunting and beautifully written book.”
—The Wall Street Journal“Gessen’s delicate prose and deft skill as an interviewer combine with Friedman’s haunting photography to produce a partial record of the ruins of Soviet prison camps in Sandarmokh, Perm and Kolyma, and of the fraught memorialization efforts that followed perestroika and the Soviet Union’s collapse.”
— Times Literary Supplement“The author Masha Gessen and the photographer Misha Friedman have done what they could in
Never Remember to combat the erasure of memory regarding the Gulag. They have accomplished this in two distinct but complementary ways—Gessen by interviewing descendants of those imprisoned as well as other private citizens who have in various ways done what they could to document and preserve the record of mass incarceration and state-murder, and Friedman by photographing the ghostly—and certainly haunting—remains of the camps.”
—The Daily Beast“A book that belongs on the shelf alongside
The Gulag Archipelago.”
—Kirkus Reviews“Drawing on years of interviews, research, and travel, Gessen and photographer Friedman reflect on complex Russian attitudes to the legacy of the gulag in this vital collection of essays and photographs.... Friedman’s moody, panoramic black-and-white photos of the memorial sites convey a narrative that’s fragmented, blurry, and ultimately incomplete, perfectly underscoring Gessen's text. The combination is a powerful meditation on contemporary Russia as seen through its relationship to the past.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
