I think that must have been true, because over the course of the war none of our “great writers” got even a scratch. However, several lesser-known writers died or had been taken prisoner.
The story of the great Tatar poet Musa Dzhalil comes to mind. My second uncle, Fazil Nugumanov, seems to be one of the last people to have seen him before he was taken prisoner. Uncle Fazil also narrowly escaped captivity, along with the remnants of the army of the “great commander”, Lieutenant General Vlasov, who was one of Stalin’s favorites. He told us that Musa had come to his mud-hut late at night in the spring of 1942 and introduced himself as a newsman. My uncle understood that he was a Tatar and they started talking. Musa said that the situation was alarming. This was true. My uncle, a First Corporal Commander, gave Musa something to eat and put him to sleep in his own bed. Early in the morning, the poet heartily thanked my uncle Fazil and left.
Then the army was encircled, with no hope for a breakthrough. The enemy’s troops methodically, with German meticulousness, and with the help of artillery, crushed the remnants of the army. They were addressing everybody on a radio megaphone, suggesting they surrender. My uncle and a few others in one section of the front were lucky enough to break through the continuous barrage of German mortar fire.
General Vlasov surrendered, along with what was left of his army. The poet Musa Dzhalil was among the captives. Once he was in German territory he started an active campaign among the captive soldiers, urging them not to fight against the USSR in the army of the general-traitor, who had crossed over to the German side. Dzhalil was betrayed and found himself in the infamous Moabit jail in Berlin. He was sentenced to death by beheading, but while he was waiting for his execution, the poet wrote his immortal Moabit Notes – verses full of love for his people. Timmermans, a Belgian whose cell neighbored Musa’s, was lucky to survive. He fulfilled the request of the poet and brought these verses out of the jail.
When I am in Kazan, I look at the beautiful monument to the poet with infinite pain, and think about the greatness of my people, who despite all oppression and adversity, preserved themselves and nurtured such heroes as Musa, who the whole progressive world is proud of. Certainly, he was a Communist and looked at many things through the prism of the party philosophy. But his whole-hearted devotion to his people and his love for humanity is an example of genuine heroism, the kind which helped us to hold out and win in the unequal struggle against Fascism.
In addition to the books which my father brought back from the regional center, the radio became a window to the world for me.
In 1947, my father was the first man in the village to buy a battery powered radio-set. Our whole family liked to listen to concerts of Tatar and Bashkir music. Sometimes in the evenings, I would dial the tuner of the radio and listen to voices speaking in different languages. At that time, I studied Russian very hard, though my knowledge of it was weak. Once I heard something unusual through the constant crackle and background noise, and I understood some things. In an anxious voice, the announcer was talking about slavery in the USSR, about the inevitably hopeless position of the peasants and collective farmers, and about the suffering of former Soviet war captives in numerous concentration camps. I was scared by my discovery, but I didn’t even tell my parents about it. They didn’t suspect what their son’s new preoccupation was. Sometimes they reprimanded me, asking what good there was in listening to this noise and crackling.
Very soon, I found out that this was called “The Voice of America”. Of course, it was very difficult for me to believe everything that the American radio was broadcasting, considering that I had never been to the city or seen a railway. However, something that was said about the poor and powerless peasants seemed true to me, even though I was just a boy. Probably that was the time when doubt was conceived in my soul, which would guide and shape my behavior later on.
Indeed, I once saw how an old man, who had lost all his sons in the war, was forced to sign up for a huge loan. He asked in despair where he would get so much money from, if he was paid nothing in the collective farm where he worked. The man and his old wife had nothing to live on. Through the open window of the village council building, which was near our house, I heard the commissioner from the regional center, yelling and threatening, “You, son of a bitch! Do you dare to slander the party and the Soviet system? Thank God your sons are dead, or you would damn sure be serving your term in jail. You are a lucky man. Our party is kind and I am just sending you to the storeroom, so that you, bastard, can think over your crime tonight. Probably, I will be satisfied by your signature, for the amount I offered you.”
“The Voice of America” was also right about the limitless taxes, which the peasants simply couldn’t pay. I remember once that all the fruit trees disappeared from the yards in our village, as if by collusion. Peasants chopped them down to avoid paying a tax for each tree. In the severe continental climate of Bashkortstan, each apple-tree, even if it was simply a wild variety with small apples, was precious and practically the only source of vitamins. For some reason, Tatars and Bashkirs at that time rarely grew vegetables in their villages, and they only started growing potatoes after the war. There was no money to buy grain, and collective farmers received a few hundred grams of rye as payment for a so-called working unit (this was a unit of measuring labor). I remember once, that in the neighboring village of Minishta, people received a whole kilogram of it! This was a real sensation. It was hard to believe. All the milk from the private cows of each collective farmer was given to the state, and as soon as a calf was born, it was taken away as meat tax. Every hen was counted and a collective farmer had to hand over all the eggs.
At that time, the tax agents were merciless. One cruel agent with eyes empty from drinking was especially ferocious. He had a Russian last name, Murov, though he was a Tatar. He would enter the house where a family couldn’t pay taxes, make a list of all the things that could be confiscated, and then he took the sheep and goats.
Once he came to the home of a widow, who was our neighbor. At that time, there were only two sons at home, 16-year-old Madikhat and 7-year-old Favaris. Kanifa-apa herself was serving her compulsory “labor minimum” at the collective farm. Each adult had to serve a required number of “working units” there. If anyone failed to do this, for any reason, he or she was inevitably sent to do corrective work collecting wood in the mountainous regions of Bashkortstan.
Cursing away, Murov started collecting things from the house. When that seemed too little for him (what could be precious in poor peasant homes at that time?), he seized an axe and threatened the boys. He told them he would kill them if they didn’t tell him where all the valuables were hidden. The heart of the poor Madikhat couldn’t stand it and he fainted. My mother and the whole village came running to save the boy. At that time, we couldn’t even dream of doctors. There were none in the neighborhood. The villagers managed to nurse the boy back to health.
We were the children of teachers (at that time, we were a family of four, plus my grandmother), but we suffered the same hardships and often we were starving. The salaries of our parents, minus the numerous taxes and the state loan installments, which sometimes amounted to half of your annual salary, weren’t even enough to put food on the table, never mind buying any decent clothes. Every day after school, my younger sister Lisa and I grated two large buckets of potatoes with a homemade grater made from a half-rusty piece of iron sheet. Our hands were constantly bleeding and aching because of this monstrous labor. But what could we do if we had no flour and potatoes replaced bread?