Juxtapose the Past and the Present
When you give a description of a place, tell what it was like in the past and how it has changed, drawing on travelers' accounts and the reminiscences of old-time residents.
One need only read Polyakov's account of Aleksandrovsk valley and compare it with what is there now, to appreciate how much heavy, truly punishing labor has gone into cultivating this area. "From the heights of neighboring mountains," writes Polyakov, "Aleksandrovsk valley appears overgrown, dark, and forested.a tremendous conifer forest covers a significant portion of the valley floor." He describes the swamps, the impenetrable quagmires, the repulsive soils and the forests where, "in addition to gigantic trees rising from bare roots, the ground is littered with monstrous, rotting logs felled by age or downed by winds; mossy hillocks poke out of the root balls of trees that have fallen across gullies and ravines." Now, however, instead of the taiga, the gullies, and the ravines, we find entire towns; streets have been laid out; meadows, fields of rye, and vegetable patches are green with new growth; and people are already complaining that the forests are disappearing
The Aleksandrovsk Post was established in 1881. An official who has been living on Sakhalin for the last ten years told me that when he first arrived at Aleksandrovsk Post, he nearly drowned in the mud. Father Irakly, who lived at Aleksandrovsk Post until 1886, told me that originally it had only three houses, and that the small barracks where the musicians now live used to house the prison. The streets were full of stumps. The brickworks now occupy what used to be a sable trapping area in 1882. Father Irakly was given the option of using the sentry booth as a church, but he turned it down because it was too small. Weather permitting, he would celebrate mass on the square; in bad weather he used the barracks or any other space that came available, and limited himself to officiating only at the morning service.
"There you are, celebrating mass, and all of a sudden chains start rattling," he told me. "It's noisy, the heat is infernal. I'm reciting, 'Holy, holy, holy.' while right next to me somebody's screaming, 'I'll break your g '" Every
one of the various construction projects, including removing the stumps and draining the wetlands, was carried out by convicts. Until 1888, when the present prison was built, they were housed in yurts and dugouts, pits dug into the ground to a depth of four to five feet and covered with double-
pitched sod roofs At present, Aleksandrovsk occupies an
area of roughly 1.3 square miles Wooden sidewalks run
along the streets. Everything is neat and tidy, and there are no puddles or heaps of rubbish even in alleys far from the center of town, in the poorest neighborhoods.
Juxtapose the Unfamiliar with the Familiar
The northern part of Sakhalin Island—the area traversed by the permafrost belt—corresponds in its physical characteristics to Ryazan' province, and the south resembles the Crimea. The island is 594 miles in length; in width, it ranges from 82.5 miles across at its widest point, to 16.5 miles at the narrowest. The island is twice the size of Greece and one and a half times the size of Denmark.
When the zoologist Polyakov charted the Duyka River— also known as the Aleksandrovsk—he found it to be some seventy feet wide at its lower reaches. Enormous heaps of uprooted trees covered the banks. In many places, the lowlands were overgrown with old stands of fir, larch, alder, and willow, and surrounded by impassable bogs. Today the river resembles a long, narrow puddle. Its wide and bare banks and sluggish current make one think of the Moscow Canal.
At first glance, Korsakov looks deceptively like one of those charming, backward, typically Russian villages that are still untouched by civilization. On my first visit, I arrived on a Sunday, after dinner. The weather was calm, warm, and there was a festive feel in the air. Peasants were napping in the shade or drinking tea. Women were sitting outside the huts, by the doors or under the windows, and picking lice out of each other's hair. There were flowers in the small yards and gardens, and the sills of the windows were filled with geraniums. The street was full of children playing at soldiers or trying to ride "horsy" on fat dogs who would rather have been sleeping.
Decide What Names to Use
Identify the characters by first and last name, and when in doubt, use initials.
The following day I paid a visit to the commandant of the island, V. O. Kononovich. Though fatigued and short of time, the general received me most graciously and spent about an hour conversing with me.
"Allow me to introduce myself," the official said. " I am Collegiate Registrar D."
This was my first Sakhalin acquaintance, a poet, the author of a mock epic entitled Sakhalinу, which began with the words: "Tell me, doctor, in vain was it that " Subsequently he became a frequent visitor and walking companion around Aleksandrovsk and its surroundings, regaling me with anecdotes and endless recitations of his own poetry. On long winter evenings he writes stories with a liberal cast, but if necessary is quick to remind people that he is a Collegiate Registrar, Tenth Class.11 Once, when a peasant woman came to see him on business and addressed him as "Mister D," he took offense and furiously corrected her: "I am no 'Mister D' to you: I am 'Your Worship!'"
Provide Summaries of Chapters
It might be useful to begin each chapter with a detailed summary of the central arguments.
Chapter III. The Census. Contents of the Statistical Forms. The Questions I Posed and the Answers I Received. Peasant Homes and Their Occupants. Exiles' Opinions of the Census.
Chapter XXII. Sakhalin Escapees. Reasons for Escape. Breakdown of Escapees by Origin, Rank, Etc.
last things
Where to Publish
Letter to Alexei Suvorin, January 2,1894
My Sakhalin is an academic work and will win me the Metropolitan Macarius Award.12 Medicine will no longer be able to reproach me with disloyalty: I will have paid my dues to scholarship and to what the old writers used to call pedantry. And I am pleased to add this convict coat to the closet of my literary wardrobe. Let it hang there! I should not, of course, try to publish Sakhalin in the...[New Times] since this is not a journalistic piece. But I do think that a small, separate volume could be useful.
Plan Your Celebration
Letter to Yakov Korneyev,13 March 27, 1894
Most honorable Yakov Alekseevich! I had a plan: to bring you a copy of my Sakhalin—with an appropriate inscription—as soon as it appeared in print. But as I was about to take a cab to the railway station, that is, at the very beginning of my journey, you forced me to drink three glasses of Santorini wine "for the road," and those three glasses, as much as your good wishes, evidently served me well, because I traveled safely.
Plan Your Next Trip
Letter to Alexei Suvorin, July 11, 1894
This is my plan. On July 20 or 22, I will go to Taganrog to tend my uncle who is seriously ill and insists on my treating him. He is an excellent man, and it would be awkward to refuse, although I am certain that my help will do him no good. I will be spending between one and three days in Taganrog, swimming in the sea, visiting the cemetery—and then, back to Moscow. Now that I am done with Sakhalin and have given my thanks to the powers above, I proclaim myself a free man, ready to go wherever I please.