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Many more volumes of prose, poetry, and even stage plays remain to be translated. Completing that task has been Ignat’s new focus, because, as the son puts it, “It’s important today that everything flows through English.”

His father lived a long life, but even so, how did he manage an output so vast? “He did not understand the concept of writer’s block. He felt it was a luxury experienced by writers in well-to-do circumstances who could choose to write but also choose not to write, while in his case, he was from a youngest age compelled by fate and his desire and his gift to be a writer. This was greatly fortified by the sense of duty to use his remaining years to document and record and expose the truth about Russia, truth that was not only neglected but in many cases covered up, concealed, distorted, and lied about by the Bolsheviks and their successors.”

Reflections on Classical Music

Ignat Solzhenitsyn's devotion to his father's work echoes his own commitment to an art form that conveys the values of an era gone by. Gazing out onto a contemporary cultural landscape that often engages in anti-Western animus, where culture itself is considered suspect if its origins are European, what future does he see for the classical music he loves?

“We are seemingly in the process of throwing overboard the heritage of Western culture. I would think that, when contrasted with so many unjust and vile things we’ve done as a species, culture would be seen to stand as representing the best we have done. This idea that we should toss it because it doesn’t fit the current narrative is profoundly short-sighted and may yet lead to catastrophic, irreversible results. I hope and believe, however, that will not be the case.” What forms the foundation of his optimism? “For as long as we are human, we will need music. We do not live by bread alone,” Solzhenitsyn said, alluding to the Biblical passage, Matthew 4:4: “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.”

“That passage has always struck me. It’s so counter-intuitive in a way. What could we possibly need besides the material? But most of us, at some point, search for spiritual nourishment. Classical music will always be needed.” •