ABSTRACT
Solzhenitsyn had then been a mystery to Western readers, an enigma wrapped in the aura of martyrdom created by his expulsion, and for many months after that a silent hermit in the heart of Switzerland. For some the publication came as a welcome antidote to the dismay and doubt sown by Solzhenitsyn’s American speeches among many of his admirers. Solzhenitsyn’s exhaustive anatomy of the system, resting partly on oral accounts by ex-prisoners and partly on obscure and hard-to-obtain archival material, was difficult going in parts, but the bill of indictment was formidable. The picture of Solzhenitsyn that emerged was of an individual who had heard, seen, and suffered much but who had been saved by his religious faith and a return to traditional Russian Christian values. In the course of the autumn of 1975 Solzhenitsyn made several statements denying newspaper reports about one or another aspect of his private life.
