Most of the events of "Life and Fate" take place in the Soviet Union during the late autumn and winter of 1942-43. It was the time of Operation Blue and Operation Fischreiher, the continuation into a second year of Nazi Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union that had started with Operation Barbarossa; it was the time of the Battle of Stalingrad. But, just as much as it takes place as a part of the Second World War, it takes place as part of the history of Stalinist Russia.