Life and Fate - Historical Context

Historical Context

Life and Fate takes place during Nazi Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union, mainly focusing on the battle of Stalingrad. The book begins when Germany lays siege to the city, trying to conquer it. Throughout the book, there are references of the decaying city and the damage from aerial bombardments and artillery based around the city. There are also occasions in the Russian novel in which the German blocade is quite noticeable. The characters are suffering from starvation and the lack of clean water. The book ends with the surrender of the German field-marshal Friedrich Paulus' 6th Army remnants and the return of civilians to the city.

The novel's characters are a combination of fictional and historical figures. The famous characters include Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler. Many of the characters are more loosely based on a historical figure, or a representative Russian. The main character, Viktor Shtrum, is a “self portrait” of Grossman himself, though Shtrum also incorporates elements of the Jewish physicist Lev Landau, who was dismissed from his job because of the anti-Jewish movement in the Soviet Union. Viktor Shtrum’s opinions and thoughts are really the thoughts and words of Vasily Grossman. Shtrum’s negative thoughts towards communism are Grossman’s opinions.

In Life and Fate, there are different times when the Nazi concentration camps are mentioned. Vasily Grossman includes a major part of Life and Fate about a German prison camp, where many characters are on their way to the gas chamber and get gassed, then follows a dialog of ranked Nazi officers who toast inside a new gas chamber for its opening. The characters that were shipped off to Germany were caught leaving one of the countries under Nazi rule. Grossman’s inclusion is historically accurate, since there are records of many Russians in Nazi labor and death camps. Grossman also includes another German concentration camp, where one of Grossman’s main arguments takes place concerning communism and fascism. Grossman takes many pages concerning the prisoners of Soviet and German labor and concentration camps, which is necessary for a complete World War II experience.