+----------------------------+------------------+---+-------------------+
| National Park Service      | Manzanar         |   | PO Box 426        |
|                            |                  |   |                   |
| U.S. Department of the     | National         |   | 5001 Highway 395  |
| Interior                   | Historic Site    |   |                   |
|                            |                  |   | Independence, CA  |
|                            | Use the complete |   | 93526             |
|                            | site name here   |   |                   |
|                            | (e.g. Palo Alto  |   | 760 878-2194      |
|                            | Battlefield      |   | phone             |
|                            | Historic Site).  |   |                   |
|                            |                  |   | 760 878-2949 fax  |
+----------------------------+------------------+---+-------------------+

![](media/image1.png){width="0.5597222222222222in"
height="0.7201388888888889in"}

**Manzanar National Historic Site** News Release

  -----------------------------------------------------------------------
  Use a "short-hand" version of the site name here (e.g. Palo Alto
  Battlefield not Palo Alto Battlefield National Historical Site).

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For Immediate Release: January 17, 2007

Contact: Gretel Enck

Phone: 760 878-2194 ext. 2713

**Manzanar Invites Regional Book Clubs to Read Gulag Classic**

Manzanar National Historic Site invites book clubs of Eastern California
to be a part of this year's Gulag experience by choosing to read a
thematic literary classic. We encourage clubs to read *One Day in the
Life of Ivan Denisovich* by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn as their March, 2007,
selection. In support of this invitation, book stores and libraries in
Inyo and Mono County will be offering questions for discussion and
featuring the novel for sale or loan.

The National Park Service, in a unique partnership with the Gulag Museum
at Perm-36, Russia, the International Memorial Society, and Amnesty
International USA, is presenting a traveling exhibition in the United
States on the Soviet Gulag. Manzanar National Historic Site and the
Eastern California Museum host *GULAG: Soviet Forced Labor Camps and the
Struggle for Freedom* February 17 to October 21, 2007. The exhibit will
be on display at the Eastern California Museum in Independence,
California.

In 1945, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was sentenced to eight years in the
labor camps for criticizing Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin in letters to
a friend. Seventeen years later he turned his experience into *One Day
in the Life of Ivan Denisovich*, the first literary work to describe the
brutalities of prison under Stalin. It marked the beginning of Soviet
prison-camp literature. Solzhenitsyn used third-person direct speech,
examining the Soviet life through the eyes of a simple Everyman. Written
in direct style, it described the horrors of just one day in a labor
camp. The book gained fame both in the USSR and the West and it
catapulted Solzhenitsyn to fame, but after the praise came persecution.
Solzhenitsyn\'s books were banned and KGB surveillance intensified.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970 "for
the ethical force with which he has pursued the indispensable traditions
of Russian literature.\" But he declined to go to Stockholm to receive
the prize for fear he would not be readmitted to the Soviet Union by the
government upon his return.

The first part of his epic three-volume work, *The Gulag Archipelago*,
was published in Paris in 1973. It solidified his name as synonymous
with Gulag literature. But it enraged the Soviet government and
Solzhenitsyn was exiled abroad, which for a Russian writer, he said,
amounted to a spiritual death. He lived in the United States until being
allowed to return home in 1994.

*One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich*, along with other Gulag titles,
will be available starting in February at many area outlets including
Spellbinder Books and East Side Books in Bishop, Booky Joint in Mammoth,
Manzanar National Historic Site and Eastern California Museum in
Independence, and Inyo and Mammoth County Libraries. These stores and
libraries will also be distributing a list of questions for discussion
that can be used by book clubs to explore the book's themes and spark
dialogue.

We then invite book club participants to view the exhibit to learn more
about what has been called one of the greatest human tragedies of the
20^th^ Century. The Eastern California Museum is located at 155 North
Grant Street, 3 blocks west of the courthouse, in Independence. The
Museum is open 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. daily except Tuesdays. The
Museum's phone number is 760.878.0258. Admission is free.

Manzanar National Historic Site is located six miles south of
Independence on U.S. Highway 395 and contains exhibits and audio-visual
programs related to the World War II internment of Japanese Americans.
For more information please visit [www.nps.gov/manz or call
760.878.2194](http://www.nps.gov/manz or call 760.878.2194), ext. 2710.

Please visit [www.gulaghistory.org](http://www.gulaghistory.org/) to
take a virtual tour of the exhibit, learn more about the Gulag
experience, and follow the traveling exhibit.

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