Jorge Lopez- Question Commander

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Alexander Solzhenitsyn

Page 134- 167

To begin off, I really liked this weeks reading. Throughout the book, some questions came up to my mind. Some of them where general questions, and some where specific questions. So, I will start off with a general question. "Why are there so many innocent people in the camp?"  

Well, as you may know, most of the people from the Soviet camp are Russians. The Russian government is really mean and harsh. With that being said, the Russian government want more people in their camps suffering, and working all day long. But you might ask to yourself "how does this benefit the government?"  In these camps, soldiers create things that are really useful. The government get these things for free, and they use it or sell it. By doing this, the government would get rich.

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So, as I read the book, I perceived something. I noticed that the author in the title gave the protagonist name Ivan Denisovich. But, throughout the book his name is Shukhov. I stopped my reading, and I asked myself why. Why did the author do this? So, I started to think that it was because of the government. People there know him mostly by Shukhov, which I believe is his nickname. So, I think that Alexander (the author) wanted to create more of a realistic environment, by putting in his nickname.

Why don't the prisoners simply rebel against the guards?
Throughout the entire book, we have repeatedly heard about the harshness and unfairness of the guards in this camp. We have also heard about how there are many more prisoners than guards at this camp. While some people may think that the reason that they don't rebel against the Guards are because they don't have weapons, whereas the guards do, I believe that there is a deeper reason for this. I think that the reason the prisoners don't rebel is because they are broken inside. This particular circumstance can be compared to the Slaves in the US hundreds of years ago. Just like them, I think that the prisoners no longer have the willpower or mental strength to rebel. This is because the guards have already taken all of it, and have created robots who, even though are put into extreme situations, do not realize they have a way out..                           

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