Children of the Arbat Anatoli Rybakov, Century Hutchinson, £12.95 Reviewed by JANE WELLS
ANATOLI Rybakov wass a
Russian Jew, born in 1911, exiled to Siberia in 1932 for 'assisting in
counter revolutionary activity';
released in 1935 but forced to
travel from village to village
looking for work since he was
banned from settling in the big
cities. He enlisted to fight with
the Red Army in the second
world war in 1941. His first
novel, published in 1950, won
the Stalin prize for literature.
Children of the Arbat,
'housewives'. Again we have recipes, but they are more about how to make a stick of celery satisfy your hunger when you actually want a pound of spuds. our weight. They have a crusade about 'fat Fergie'. Week in, week out, pictures about 'fat Fergie', who, according to Bella is not only fat but also ugly. She is not new-born brat in Britain with various nannies while she hops off to wear hideous dresses and shake the hands of the Australian 'let yourself" get fat, you will become ugly and irresponsible mothers too. Then, as night follows day, your hubby will disappear with his secretary who (at this moment at least) is not fat! Subtlety is not Bella's strong
Another 'must' for the traditional woman's magazine is the handy hints section, written by keen and generous readers. woman spends her time and energy sending in this little tibit: 'If you hang a load of conkers in your wardrobe you will never be troubled by moths again. What?? How did the unnamed shattering fact?
Rybakov's twelfth book, is an uncompromisingly anti-stalinist young friends from Moscow's intellectual and artistic district,
the Arbat, leaving school in 1934.
The semi-autobiographical
Communist, who falls victim to
one of Stalin's early purges. Its descriptions of this period of
Stalin's terror are unequivocal.
For more than twenty years
Rybakov's manuscript lay on the
shelf, its publication thwarted by
the authorities. Rybakov, has
consistently turned down offers
insisting instead that his book
should be made available first to
Russian readers. 'My people and
my country need this novel...
Life would not be the same without the problem page. Even in the traditional magazines, sex male lover, male brother-in-law, male doctor, and so on and so forth. They have even begun to tackle what to do if you find out husband is gay or a transvestite. Everything except sex between women. Either lesbians do not have problems, or lesbianism is still too risky to be discussed or even recognised.
You don't get all this rubbish in magazines like Spare Rib or Everywoman; but as most of us will admit (though often only in private) they are a touch turgid and can be a little too 'worthy' in the way they deal with aspects of laugh about in most women's lives - the Tories have seen to that. But there is a huge gap in the market. An entertaining feminist magazine may not be able to match the circulation of allow women who are actively involved in politics to relax and have a good read!
If there are any rich feminists magazine, I volunteer to be the "agony sister". consequences of Stalinism in the
psychology of our people we
cannot move forward. If we say
we wish to live honestly and
truthfully, then we must be
truthful about the past. We cannot bring up our children on
Not until glasnost did it finally
Children of the Arhat is no
dry, pedantic political tract. The
first extracts were serialised were
soon fetching fifty times their
cover price is a tribute to its
readability as well as its politics.
Rybakov examines a broad
sweep of everyday and political
Soviét life. How you get a job in
the Soviet Union - and how you
get a good job. How families SOCIALIST OUTLOOK no 10 November 1988