Vasily Grossman - soedinennyi skrezhet

[Robert Chandler]

Dear all,

Many, may thanks for many helpful suggestions.  One anonymous correspondent
beautifully defined skrezhet asΠthe grinding noise that metal makes against
metal, or teeth against teeth, or, metaphorically, when the heart grinds
against metal.¹

Now that I am confident that this skrezhet is NOT primarily a real sound
emitted by the barbed wire, I shall probably translate as follows.  This
time I am including the previous para as well:

And this is why the Russian prophets were so tragically mistaken.  Where,
where can we find this ŒRussian soul, all-human and all-unifying¹ ­ that
Dostoevsky told us would Œspeak the final word of the great general harmony,
of the final brotherly concord of all tribes according to the law of the
Gospel of Christ?¹

Where indeed, O Lord, is this all-human and all-unifying soul to be found?
Did the prophets of Russia ever imagine that their prophecies about the
coming universal triumph of the Russian soul would find their fulfilment in
the unified grating and grinding of the barbed wire stretched around
Auschwitz and the labour camps of Siberia?

Vsego dobrogo,

R.

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