Котлован by Andrei Platonov
Set during early Soviet industrialization, the novel follows a group of impoverished workers and Party activists ordered to dig a vast foundation pit for a promised communal house that is meant to embody the new socialist future. As the pit deepens, personal hopes and human dignity are eroded by bureaucratic slogans, ideological zeal, and material hardship, revealing the absurdity and cruelty beneath utopian rhetoric. The narrative moves through bleak, existential reflection on language, labor, and human worth, culminating in tragedy that exposes the human cost of enforced collectivization and the hollowness of grand political promises.
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- Published
- Unknown
- Nationality
- Russian
- Length
- Unknown
- Pages
- Unknown
- Original Language
- Russian
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- Alternate Titles
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- Kotlovan
- The Foundation
- The Foundation Pit
- The Pit
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