Alexander Solzhenitsyn's Cancer Ward

This study will provide a review of Alexander Solzhenitsyn's novel Cancer Ward. The review will consider the information and knowledge conveyed in the book, the major issues and themes in the book, and what the two main characters (Kostoglotov the protagonist and Rusanov the antagonist) lived by, or what sustained them in life.

In the author's letter to the Fourth Congress of Soviet writers, which is included in the Bantam edition, he argues for the end to Soviet censorship. It is ironic that the letter was written arguing for the end to official delays in publishing this novel, for Cancer Ward is certainly one of the least overtly politically threatening of his works. It certainly can be interpreted as a veiled indictment of the oppression of the totalitarian Soviet system, but at least on the surface it is far less such an indictment than many of his earlier works.

Still, Cancer Ward touches on many issues which are critical of the Soviet system directly and indirectly, but what makes this novel different from the author's other more directly political works is the fact that he focuses more on the personal and internal realities of the main characters.

Kostoglotov is a former prisoner whose need to know what is happening to him, the nature of his disease and the process of treatment, springs from the consciousness of a man who has learned to distrust all authority. Although the issue is cancer rather than politics, the division between the two men in terms of what su

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st be someone's fault that he was not being treated! He had to do something! Rusanov despised inactivity and ineffectual characters" (17). He does not want to know what is going on, but only wants action to be taken immediately by the medical authorities which will right the situation. The stark contrast between the hardened and suspicious Kostoglotov and the fantasy-ridden Rusanov is highlighted in their first encounter. Rusanov demands that the light in the ward be turned off so that he can sleep. But Kostoglotov says, "Who d'you think you are, you're not the only person here." Rusanov tells the man, "You might be a little more polite." He asks him what he needs the light for, and Kostoglotov "coarsely" answers, "So I can pick my asshole" (19-20). Rusanov thinks he is above life and death, that he is better than everyone else, and this belief has sustained him throughout his life --- until now. Never before has he been thrown in with the riffraff, and this Kostoglotov is apparently the worst of the lot. Rusanov tells the other man, "There are different sorts of patients here and distinctions have to be made," and Kostoglotov answers, "There'll be distinctions . . . They'll write you an obituary: Party member since the y

Category: Literature - A