Reading Reflection #3

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
Alexander Solzhenitsyn
pg. 152-192

Something about this book that I was noticing quite a bit on Friday is how the emotions are portrayed without telling you that a character is feeling a certain way. When I look back to the beginning of the book, it says things like “All the time he dreaded the morning. But the morning came, as it always did.”(pg. 3) there you can see that he is groggy and tired, not in a good mood but not too bad off. In what I read on Friday I can find a quote as follows, “Once they’d tried to beat him up but the cooks all rushed out to help him. And a choice bunch of ugly fat-faced bastards they were too.” (pg 162.) He is talking about people that, although he may not like them much, had tried to help him and he is so bitter and angry. This is all because of the progression of his day of course, the point being that you can feel it as Ivan gets tired and ready to end off the day and go back to bed. I love this idea of experiencing a day of a life like this but when I started this book, not once did I consider that the author might have factored in such details as this, it can give you some insight into his mind while he was writing along with the mind of the character her was creating. 

I also want to discuss the Idea of freedom used throughout this book. It’s true that you don’t know what you have until it’s gone and as I read I can feel that idea within each prisoner of having everything they ever enjoyed taken away from them. On page 159 we learn about rules put in place in the camp, one of them being that prisoner are not allowed to walk around alone. "...had made this order to take their last bit of freedom away,". All of the prisoners know how little they have, especially since some of them went from having it all to having nothing, so putting yourself in their shoes is an enlightening experience. You realize how bad things really do get for some people in this world. 
I loved experiencing this book and have finnished it. It's an easy read and a story that can fascinate if you let it, I would really recommend finding this book and giving it a try if you haven't already.