The People Immortal

The People Immortal is a novel by Lev Grossman that follows a Red Army regiment during the catastrophic defeats of the war's first months. It combines a journalist's eye with a novelist's empathy and is considered one of Grossman's three great war novels. The book was read as a textbook and a work of military education and includes a wealth of background material.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 352 pages
Publication date: 08 June 2023
Publisher: Quercus Publishing

One of Grossman's three great war novels, alongside Life and Fate and Stalingrad, is The People Immortal. A significant, valuable addition to Grossman's small but powerful body of work, WILLIAM BOYD. A remarkable novel that illuminates the terrible realities of Barbarossa and the banal horror of warfare with incomparable understanding and insight, JONATHAN DIMBLEBY. There are always good reasons for reading Grossman, but few times are as resonant as our own. Financial Times. At the heart of his writing lies a tireless humanity and empathy. Telegraph. Grossman combines a journalist's eye with a novelist's empathy. Spectator. Set during the catastrophic defeats of the war's first months, it tracks a Red Army regiment that wins a minor victory in eastern Belorussia but fails to exploit this success. A battalion is then entrusted with the task of slowing the German advance, and eventually encircled, before ultimately breaking out and joining with the rest of the Soviet forces. Grossman's descriptions of the natural world—and his characters' relationship to it—are both vivid and unexpected, as are his memorable character sketches: eleven-year-old Lionya is determined to hang on to his toy revolver as he walks a long distance behind German lines; his defiant grandmother slaps a German officer in the face and is shot; Kotenko, a fiercely anti-Soviet peasant who initially welcomes the Germans, hangs himself in despair when they treat him with contempt; and Semion Ignatiev, a womanizer and gifted story-teller, turns out to be the boldest and most resourceful of the rank-and-file soldiers. Grossman spent most of the war years close to the front line. But The People Immortal is far from being mere morale-boosting propaganda. On the contrary, as letters included in this volume make clear.

Weight: 250g
Dimension: 129 x 198 x 25 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781529414752