The Whisperers

liberalization, 622–7

liberal writers, attack on, 591, 592–3lifestyle, 483–4 literary talent, 198, 199, 269

at Literaturnaia gazeta, 483, 518–19, 520, 591

marriage to Larisa Zhadova, 608, 611

marriage to Valentina Serova, 401–2, 403, 608–9

marriage to Natalia Tipot (Sokolova), 198, 369

marriage to Zhenia Laskina, 198, 369–70, 370, 378, 517

as moderate conservative (1956–64), 616

mother’s criticism, 403–6 and Nazi–Soviet Pact, 373–4

at Novyi mir, 483, 484–5, 486, 489, 497, 499, 591, 592, 593, 615

as parent, 513–15, 612– 14 and Pasternak, 484–5patronage, exercise, 485–7, 518, 574–5personal appearance, 199, 409, 483, 484, 507

political obedience, 278, 501–6, 507–8, 519, 612

pressured to inform, 267–8, 270–71 proletarian identity, 197, 203

public duty, sense of, 503

recycles love poems, 369, 377–8 and ‘reforging’, 197–8, 200

and relative’s arrest, 278

remorse, 622, 624, 625, 629

self-censorship, 506

self-criticism, 269, 506

and Serova, 375, 377–8, 394–7, 401–3, 403, 609

social origins, 56–7, 60– 62, 63, 64, 139, 141, 197, 198, 199, 268

as Soviet deputy, 457

and Stalin, 266, 385, 409, 410–11, 503–6, 591, 593, 595, 611, 615, 621–2, 624–5, 626

Stalin and, 497

and Stalin’s death, 522–3, 524

success, 401, 415, 481, 482–3

support for regime, 60, 64, 141, 198, 204, 270, 406, 409, 410, 411, 507, 510, 616, 622, 624–5

and ‘thaw’ (1956–64), 615, 616

as war correspondent, 370–71, 381–4, 394, 399, 406–12, 446

wartime archive, 620n

whispering campaign against, 520

and White Sea Canal, 195–7

in Writers’ Union leadership, 482–3, 489

writings banned, 621

and ‘Zhdanovshchina’, 487, 489–90, 491, 506

WORKS: Alien Shadow, 505; Days and Nights, 419, 482; ‘Father’, 59; ‘Five Pages’, 369; Four Is, 627–8; ‘The General’, 200; ‘Horizon’, 198; A Hundred Days of War, 621; ‘Ice Battle, 270; If Your House is Dear to You (film), 621; ‘Kill Him!’,