It’s so strange that in Moscow I became completely estranged from it, whereas in Biysk I grew close to it again. I don’t think I will ever again abandon it seriously, and for a long time.
It’s hard for me to imagine that we will enter the Main Hall of the Conservatory again … On the very first evening, I’ll buy tickets at the door.
NOVEMBER 16, 1936
… to clarify a few important details. Please obtain the following papers before the day of my arrivaclass="underline"
(1) certificate of your employment
(2) certificate of Genrikh’s employment
(3) certificate from the Housing Committee stating that I lived there from 1923 to 1931
When I arrive, I will submit a request to the NKVD for permission to live in Moscow and to be registered there. I might postpone submitting it until the end of November, when the new Constitution is adopted, but I’m not sure. I was informed that a general amnesty was being planned for that day. Although according to my documents I was released earlier, these circumstances may have bearing on my situation, too.
Send me a postcard when you receive this letter, and let me know your phone number, and the number at Ostozhenka Street. Most likely, the old number, 1-94-13, has been changed to a direct one; and I’ve forgotten Eva’s.
The NKVD told me that they will not delay me even one extra day. It will take a few days for the police to give me a passport. I anticipate that I will be home by the end of the year. It is possible, however, that administrative complications will keep me here for another few weeks. Judging by others’ experience, no one has ever finished the term on the stipulated date.
Well, that’s about all. I sense how hard our correspondence has become for you to maintain, and not only because there isn’t enough time. In general, our communications have grown weaker—six years is a long time. And it has become difficult for me to write you as well. Sometimes I sit over a letter for a long time, and nothing comes of it.
It’s a good thing that the bad recedes into the past.
I kiss you.
—J.
41 Letters from the Willow Chest
War
(1942–1943) SVERDLOVSK–MOSCOW GENRIKH TO MARUSYA Checked by the Military Censor
FEBRUARY 3, 1942
My dearest mother! I haven’t heard anything from you for a long time—why? If you only knew how necessary your letters are to me, you would write more often. There’s not a single person here I can share my thoughts and worries with, not a single person from whom I could expect to hear a kind word. And only now have I come to understand how much I need that. Mother, dear, best in the world, I curse the hour when I had to leave Moscow. I so want to be with you, and I could put up with the hardest circumstances if only we could endure them together. My comrades? They’re all good people, to a greater or lesser degree, but living together, seeing the same faces day in and day out, hearing the same things over and over … Well, you understand what I mean.
I’m not eating very well. This is what they feed us: I try to get up as late as I can. After that I eat three and a half ounces of bread and drink boiled water. At one in the afternoon, I go to the dining hall, where I have the midday meal and seven ounces of bread. At seven or eight in the evening, I get seven ounces of bread. Before, we used to get commercial bread, but now it has become hard to find, and you have to stand in line for it just to get eighteen ounces. But what is eighteen ounces for me? Still, I try to keep my spirits up. I received news from Tomsk. Students from my Institute who were evacuated to Tomsk are going to Moscow soon. How we envy them!
Mama, why don’t you tell me anything about yourself? This silence can be interpreted in various ways.
It’s better to write the truth than to keep silent. I understand very well that things are hard for you. If you wish, make inquiries at my Institute about the possibility of my return—but that’s a pipe dream that is not likely to come true. The most difficult thing about my situation is prospects for the future. I’m awaiting a job assignment, which will happen when I graduate from the Institute (mid-July). Either I’ll remain in Sverdlovsk and undertake something important, or I’ll have to go out to the boondocks (Lysva, Chusovaya, Beloretsk). Moreover, there’s no guarantee of being able to work there long. And dreaming about Moscow …
If possible, send me my skating boots, canvas shoes, underwear, and my old suit coat, plus a few shirts. And write me letters, and more often, please, my dear mother! I go to the post office nearly every day and try to find a trace of you—but you’re not there. The post office is rather far away, and it closes early. I don’t always make it in time.
It’s better to write directly to my address than to the post office:
Genrikh Ossetsky
Student Dormitory 1, room 417
Sverdlovsk, 9 Vtuzgorodok, Ural Industrial Institute
I send you many, many kisses!
Genrikh
P.S. Did you find Jack Rubin? Checked by the Military Censor
FEBRUARY 8, 1942
Dear Mother,
I have been thinking over what I have lived through during the past week. I feel that during those days I experienced a sharp turnaround. The first three days of February were very difficult, and my mood was dark. The change in diet was just an impetus. I thought about many things during this time, and suddenly there was a breakthrough. It became clear that I had lived my life without achieving anything. Recently, I turned in a design project for machine tooling, and got the highest mark for it; but this didn’t make me happy. I felt indifferent to it. I am now carrying out a special commission for which I’ll be paid and which will count as a design project for the cutting-instrument course. Now the chance to earn a bit of extra money has turned up, but I can’t take advantage of it, because I am under constant pressure with the various design projects I have to submit. There are a lot of them!
My dear mother! It hurts me so much that you don’t tell me anything about yourself, but toss off these postcards that reveal nothing. You don’t answer any of my questions, and it ends up being not a correspondence but an exchange of greetings—nothing more. In all this time, I have received only one letter, dated January 2! I can imagine how tired you are when you come home after work and collapse on the divan. You haven’t told me how you like your new job. Have you really become a person who just punches in and out at work? I can’t imagine it!
I’ve become used to my new diet here.
Now that my health has recovered a bit, I can inform you: I had Pityriasis rosea, a very uncomfortable rashlike condition. Now I’m completely cured.
In the Ural Worker newspaper, there are often essays by Lyudm. Alex. They are completely without redeeming qualities. And you magnanimously opined that she still had time to learn. It’s too late for her to learn.
That is not at all what I wanted to write you, though. I’m unable to determine my own state of affairs. Perhaps with time everything will become clear. I’m feeling easier in my soul these days, but my situation is uncertain as I have begun to be aware of my own feelings, I have begun to find myself. I don’t know whether you will understand me. My dear mother, I have one dream for which I am willing to sacrifice everything—that is being together with you. Often, when I’m doing something, or making some decision, I ask myself, “What would Mama say?” Although I’ll soon be twenty-six, I sometimes feel like a little son, even helpless, and it’s very pleasant.
Sending you many, many kisses, your Genrikh. Excuse the jumble of thoughts in this letter; but what else could I do? That’s what I’m like now. Checked by the Military Censor