Catastrophe, pain and love
Svetlana Alexievich’s approach to Chernobyl
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
In Chernobyl Svetlana Alexievich tells a chronicle of the future. In the manner of her poetological programme, she describes not events, but feelings: loneliness and pain, shame and love. The feelings of the individuals dominate the text. The explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and its immediate impact stays in the background. Alexievich uses the technical tools of prose, with monological, pointed narrative, to capture the emotional impact and the new perception of life among those affected that were triggered by the nuclear accident.
(Osteuropa 1-2/2018, pp. 197–208)