Gulag: Life and Death Inside the Soviet Concentration Camps

by Tomasz Kizny

A historic photographic record of the Soviet Gulag and its legacy. The Gulag was a network of labor camps and penal colonies run by the Soviet security organizations. While forced labor and internal exile had a long history in Russia, the Gulag evolved into a devastating tool of political suppression and massive industrial production. From the early years of the Revolution to the final years of the USSR, millions labored and perished within this system. Gulag covers the history of the Gulag with incredible essays and firsthand narratives by former prisoners. The text is accompanied by photographs provided by the prisoners, survivor groups and state archives as well as contemporary photographs that show the camps as they look now. Each chapter covers a key camp or work project of the Soviet penal-industrial Each chapter Gulag is a remarkable pictorial history of a harrowing era of the twentieth century.

Genres: History, Russia, Nonfiction, War

496 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Tomasz Kizny is a photographer and journalist, born in 1958 in Wrocław. He is associated with Gazeta Wyborcza, where he publishes his photos and articles in the newspaper's ‘Big Format’ reportage section.

Reviews

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this in one sitting. The photographs are mezmerizing-- especially the current photos of abandoned crazy construction projects (like the Road of Death-- the hopeless railroad project that was foiled by Siberian nature and abandoned immediately after Stalin's death), ruinous prisons, and survivors. It was written by a Polish citizen who researched the returned Polish prisoners from the camp Vorkuta (many of the Poles in the Soviet camps were from the Home Army-- resistance fighters against the Nazis. The Home Army fighters wanted independence for Poland after the war so Stalin ruthlessly persecuted them as political enemies). After communism fell, the author went to Russia and photographed all the camps, interviewed former inmates, and completed this heartbreaking book.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

A sobering chronicle of the Soviet repression of the time. Painful to see. Should be a wake-up call to everyone against authoritarian regimes of unaccountability.

[Steve Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would love to get my hands on a copy of this haunting book. The images are just incredible. Although the majority of the pictures were taken of the camps long after they had been abandoned, I was still able to imagine what they would have been like when occupied. I recommend this alongside Gulag: A History by Anne Applebaum and The Gulag Archipelago by Solzhenitsyn.

[Stephanie]

I read this book mostly because it was really a pictorial history of some of the camps. I am fascinated with Russian history. Realistically, once one has read The Gulag Archipelagos and One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich the reader knows it all. I have found that after reading those two books, anything new I read on Gulags, just leaves me saying yup. However I am still fascinated by how long the Gulag System remained in place and how little the world knew about it.

[Glyn Longden · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating 7/10. A mainly visual depiction of Soviet labour camps from 1920's to 1950's. Remarkable pics of life in the camps and what they look like today now they have been abandoned. Very few westerners know much about this topic but the number of deaths in these camps far exceeded that of Nazi extermination camps. Makes you want to read about the KGB in Soviet society.

[Tyger · Rating 4 out of 5]

So this is a book of photgraphs and commentary that I picked up to peruse. Wow what a bummer for me, worse for those there of course, but daunting to even look at.

[Frank Pleszak · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent reference - great photos

[Gail · Rating 4 out of 5]

Exceptional dive into the visuals of a well-hidden horror. I wish I had more schema for the dive.

[AC · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars - something of a missed opportunity. Review to follow