The fate of every serious student is loneliness. If he does not appreciate it, or at least resist it, his business will not be long-lived and will probably fail. For this reason, many end up abandoning their studies, even if they believe they are not doing so. There comes a point, however, when stagnation is all too evident, and only those who have the courage to go it alone thrive. For a while, sometimes forever, it is inevitable not to have anyone to talk to. Enjoying this scenario of peace and silence is not for everyone, and it is good that it is so.
Everywhere, There Is No More Corrupting…
Everywhere, there is no more corrupting element than this thirst for influence, recognition and power. And the corruption that consumes is consummated slowly, sometimes imperceptibly, from an even natural desire, which springs up as if driven by unavoidable circumstances, stimulated by them in a very treacherous way, because at first it does not come up against moral obstacles. Then, once the first step has been taken, once the new desire has been accepted, one goes down a path that almost always has no turning back, in the middle of which one no longer recognizes the previous character, swallowed up by the illness of the desire. Relationships, new and old, only come out poisoned; interest predominates and trust becomes non-existent. In truth, a creature like this is justified in seeing the world as evil.
A Long Way From the Gulag and Siberia…
A long way from the gulag and Siberia, one of the escapees from Slavomir Rawicz’s group, impressed by the hospitality of the Mongols and Tibetans, reflects that “these people make me feel very humble. They do a lot to wipe out bitter memories of other people who have lost their respect for humanity”. And really, it is hard to imagine how it is possible that filthy, ragged foreigners, with the ghastly appearance of those who have crossed Siberia and the Gobi Desert on foot, grunting strange phonemes in an unknown language, could, as a rule, have been welcomed by peasants as brothers. The East really is special… And although they have also not escaped corruption and evil, the Orientals have never failed to point out the qualities that distinguish them from other animals.
The Long Walk, by Slavomir Rawicz
A narrative like this can hardly be matched by pure fiction. To do so, the writer has to use extreme skill in dosing the drama of the plot, so that it does not sound exaggerated, but at the same time moves and convinces. Very, very difficult… because sometimes the drama is concentrated in the unsaid, the not possible or not attempted, in what did not happen. On the other hand, we have this impressive narrative, in which what is reported appears with the exact weight of what happened. Exaggerations are methodically dispensed with, and yet, with each chapter, each page, the impression is that the narrative is always going to extremes, and the reader has to make an effort to imagine the degree of intensity of that which could be expressed with numerous exclamations. What is artistic artifice in the face of such an experience?