13. Lithuania

“Between Shades of Grey” Ruta Sepetys.

It is interesting to reflect that, in contrast to the crimes of the Nazis, there is little popular culture on the horror of the Soviet gulags – at least in my experience.  I feel I imbibed it in a vague and abstract way, without much in depth explanation or understanding. But it was a fate that befell millions of Europeans and it felt important to read a book that addressed it.

In “Between Shades of Grey” teenage Lina’s family are shaken awake in their Kaunas home by the Soviet secret police – the NKVD (later KGB) – and told they have twenty minutes to leave their home.  So begins a journey of thousands of miles and horrible trevails for Lina, her mother and her brother. Their father is already arrested, they do not know where he is, where they are going or even why they have been deported.

Between 1939 and 1941 the Soviet Union annexed the baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, installing troops and increasingly controlling the machinery of state (this was around the time they had also invaded and occupied parts of Finland).  This was the time of Stalinist terror and the Soviets arrested so-called “anti Soviet” citizens – teachers, intellectuals or political prisoners who had opposed the Russians in some way – as well as their families, and deported them to prison camps, or gulags, in Siberia and Central Asia.  Lina’s story is tinged with a double enmity, not only are Soviets the ideological oppressors, they are also the invaders of her homeland.

The gulag regime is brutal, with sadistic treatment by guards, scarce rations and crippling work.  But what comes across most strongly is the disorientation of Lina and her family. Like “Girl at War” (see post for Croatia) the story is told in first-person narration by Lina meaning mysteries are revealed slowly, if at all, and the action and deprivations have an immediate, puzzling effect.  Along with her family and the other detainees she is forced onto trains without knowing the destination, puzzles at some of the actions of the other characters – such as the love interest who seems to be collaborating with the Russians. They are told to sign draconian confessions, moved camps without reason and struggle to glean information about her father or their wider family.  Lina sees this as part of Stalin’s terror, never knowing why these things are happening to her. The Gulag system steals their agency and humanity, the only way she can fight back is through her drawings (she is a talented artist) and her will to survive:

“Was it harder to die, or harder to be the one who survived?  I was sixteen, an orphan in Siberia, but I knew. It was one thing I never questioned.  I wanted to live. […] There were only two possible outcomes in Siberia. Success meant survival.  Failure meant death. I wanted life. I wanted to survive.”

Sepetys’ family escaped Lithuania around the time this book is set, she grew up in the United States.  She wrote “Between Shades of Grey” based on interviews with multiple Lithuanian survivors of the Gulags.  This realism was very compelling, I was certainly swept along by the account. Although it is clear this wasn’t a first hand account (meaning it suffers somewhat compared to “Woman in Berlin”), the story was incredibly believable.  In at least one library near me this book was listed as Young Adult fiction and, while it would be a pretty bleak read, I would say that is the best classification. While the writing isn’t complex the story and themes are well developed and provide a fascinating and important insight into what it might be like to be caught up in that experience as a young girl.