ABSTRACT
The regimen in the investigation cells was more humane than that in the boxes, and Solzhenitsyn has described in The Gulag Archipelago how the presence of fellow prisoners made it richer in incident than the oppressive monotony of solitary confinement. The prisoners were still obliged to sleep beneath a blinding 200-watt bulb at night, with their arms outside the blankets, resorting to handkerchiefs over their faces and towels wrapped round their arms to mitigate the worst effects of these regulations. Reveille was at six o’clock sharp, and no mercy was shown to the prisoner who failed to leap from his bed without an instant’s delay, even if he had been up most of the night under interrogation. Punishments for this and other infringements ranged from immediate removal to a punishment cell, on reduced rations, to deprivation of library or exercise privileges for the entire cell. The two hours from six to eight in the morning were spent in total silence and immobility—it was an offence to doze off for a single second. All that interrupted the monotony of these two dreary hours between sleep and waking was the toilet break. Solzhenitsyn has described the routine in part 1 of The Gulag Archipelago.
