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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
exciting Partisan action,
By Chapulina R (Tovarischi Imports, USA/RUS) - See all my reviews
This review is from: All night long: a novel of guerrilla warfare in Russia (Hardcover)
When Erskine Caldwell returned in 1941 from a visit to the war-torn USSR, he wrote this gripping adventure set in occupied Byelorussia. The main protagonist is Sergei, a young tractor-driver who joins the Partisan band of the charismatic guerrilla leader Pavlenko. Separated from his wife Natasha while escaping an encirclement, Sergei worries unceasingly about her safety while continuing to carry out raids against the invaders. He and his daring comrades, with the support of the Red Army, wreck trains, ambush trucks, and pick off sentries. Tragically, successful action often reaps swift retaliation from the Hitlerites, who slaughter and burn entire villages, and kidnap young women to frontline brothels. Erskine Caldwell, who authored such "lewd" literature as "God's Little Acre" and "Tobacco Road", is probably the only American novelist of his time who could describe so unflinchingly the mass rape of Slavic peasant-girls. Throughout the book, the Germans are depicted entirely as evil, inhuman beasts. Contrastingly, the Partisans are without exception brave, noble, and good. If such characterization seems unduly simplistic for a writer of Caldwell's stature, one must consider the times in which this novel was published. No reader could fail to feel sympathy and solidarity for the sacrifices of the distant Soviet Allies. Indeed, on the back cover of my yellowing 1942 edition is a patriotic message: "This book, like all books, is a symbol of the liberty and the freedom for which we fight. You, as a reader of books, can do your share in the desperate battle to protect those liberties -- BUY WAR BONDS!"
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