Pulitzer Prize General Non Fiction Winner
Gulag: A History
by Anne Applebaum
Summary
A definitive history of the Soviet concentration camp system, tracing its arc from Lenin's earliest experiments to its slow disintegration under Gorbachev. Drawing on freshly opened archives and survivor testimony, Applebaum reconstructs daily life inside the camps and the bureaucratic machinery that sustained them. The result establishes the Gulag as a foundational institution of Soviet power rather than a peripheral cruelty.
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Historical Context & Significance
Applebaum utilized newly opened Soviet archives to prove that the Gulag was not just a series of prisons but a central pillar of the Soviet economy.