Northeast Gaorni Township:
I was born there, I grew up there;
Even though there was plenty of misery,
These mournful ballads are for you.
Novelists are forever trying to distance themselves
from politics, but the novel itself closes in on politics.
Novelists are so concerned with “man’s fate” that they
tend to lose sight of their own fate. Therein lies their
tragedy.
– Joseph Stalin