The Torture Camp on Paradise Street
Series: Harvard library of Ukrainian literature, 5
Publisher: Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute
Published: 2023-01-03
Place of publication: Cambridge, MA, USA
Language: eng
Translated from: ukr
Translation of: Світлий шлях: історія одного концтабору
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 304
ISBN-13: 9780674291089
Description: In The Torture Camp on Paradise Street, Ukrainian journalist and writer Stanislav Aseyev details his experience as a prisoner from 2015 to 2017 in a modern-day concentration camp overseen by the Federal Security Bureau of the Russian Federation (FSB) in the Russian-controlled city of Donetsk. This memoir recounts an endless ordeal of psychological and physical abuse, including torture and rape, inflicted upon the author and his fellow inmates over the course of nearly three years of illegal incarceration spent largely in the prison called Izoliatsiia (Isolation). Aseyev also reflects on how a human can survive such atrocities and reenter the world to share his story.

Since February 2022, numerous cases of illegal detainment and extreme mistreatment have been reported in the Ukrainian towns and villages occupied by Russian forces during the full-scale invasion. These and other war crimes committed by Russian troops speak to the genocidal nature of Russia’s war on Ukraine and reveal the horrors wreaked upon Ukrainians forced to live in Russian-occupied zones. It is important to remember, however, that the torture and killing of Ukrainians by Russian security and military forces began long before 2022. Rendered deftly into English, Aseyev’s compelling account offers a critical insight into the operations of Russian forces in the occupied territories of Ukraine.
Table of contents: title: Translator’s Note
pagenum: IX; title: Background
pagenum: XI; title: Foreword
pagenum: XIII; title: The Torture Camp on Paradise Street; label: Chapter 1
title: The Arrival
pagenum: 3; label: Chapter 2
title: Isolation and Prison Code
pagenum: 13; label: Chapter 3
title: Fear
pagenum: 35; label: Chapter 4
title: Pure Evil
pagenum: 41; label: Chapter 5
title: The Hour of the Quiet Ones
pagenum: 51; label: Chapter 6
title: Madness or Normalcy
pagenum: 65; label: Chapter 7
title: Time in Captivity
pagenum: 77; label: Chapter 8
title: The Blue Light: To Kill Yourself or Not?
pagenum: 83; label: Chapter 9
title: Torture: A Personal Experience
pagenum: 101; label: Chapter 10
title: What Broke Me
pagenum: 107; label: Chapter 11
title: Sex in Isolation
pagenum: 113; label: Chapter 12
title: The Escape
pagenum: 123; label: Chapter 13
title: A Hunger Strike Is Not a Way Out
pagenum: 137; label: Chapter 14
title: Why There Was Never An Uprising
pagenum: 145; label: Chapter 15
title: Mouseville: Writing in Spite of
pagenum: 157; label: Chapter 16
title: God Behind Bars
pagenum: 165; label: Chapter 17
title: Humor in Captivity
pagenum: 173; label: Chapter 18
title: Who Are These People?
pagenum: 183; label: Chapter 19
title: A Strange Survey
pagenum: 191; label: Chapter 20
title: The Man with the Dog
pagenum: 195; label: Chapter 21
title: An Exercise in Death and Freedom
pagenum: 199; label: Chapter 22
title: Not in Prague
pagenum: 207; label: Chapter 23
title: White Nights
pagenum: 215; title: Writings from Isolation; title: Christ in a Gulag
pagenum: 237; title: Named after Vladimir Lenin
pagenum: 253; title: Something about Someone
pagenum: 257; title: Heroes of Tocsin
pagenum: 259; title: To a Future Me
pagenum: 261; title: The Bell
pagenum: 263; title: Of Pipes and Men
pagenum: 269; title: An Essay about a Volcano
pagenum: 273; title: An Atheist’s Prayer
pagenum: 277; title: List of Illustrations
pagenum: 279