Ship of Widows

"My husband was killed at the front right at the beginning of the war". Thus opens The Ship of Widows, the story of five women brought together in a large communal apartment by the vagaries of war in the year 1943. The narrative traces the ebb and flow of their relationships and the changes wrought in their lives by the birth of a son to one of the women. Grekova conveys vividly not only the decisive differences between the postwar generation and those who participated in the defense of their country, but also the extraordinary capacity of human nature to endure and overcome seemingly unendurable suffering and deprivation. Above all, this text spotlights female experiences of the war: the fate of those who did not engage in battle at the front, but fought just as desperately to survive starvation, cold, and exhaustion, to maintain homes and, in a sense, a country to which soldiers could return. Ship of Widows provides a cultural key to an understudied period of Russia's history and an understudied segment of its population - women. This new paperback edition includes an illuminating foreword by Helena Goscilo.Grekova, I. is the author of 'Ship of Widows', published 1994 under ISBN 9780810111448 and ISBN 0810111446.