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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. How long does Solzhenitsyn claim it took before life in Gulag becomes bearable?

2. After Krylenko's trial, how many men were spared death by execution?

3. Which of the following terms is used to describe show trials?

4. How many defendants were a part of the first show trial in Russian history?

5. What is another word for the trains that brought prisoners out to exile?

Short Essay Questions

1. How did the peasants of Kotlas live after a Gulag prison was set up on their land in 1938?

2. When and where did the first Gulag hunger strike occur?

3. Why was capital punishment banned in 1920?

4. What did Lenin say to Gorky about the intelligentsia of Russia?

5. How did the public react to Vlasov's sentencing at his trial?

6. What was the All-Russian Central Executive Committee?

7. What did prisoners eat when they were being transported from one prison to another?

8. Why did the Bolshevik Army turn on the church, and what do it get in return?

9. What happened in the trial of Shakhty?

10. How was time in Gulag measured?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Before arriving at Gulag prison, many prisoners, including Solzhenitsyn, spent time in local prisons training for their time at hard labor. Describe life for the prisoners in the local prisons, and compare/contrast their living conditions to those in Gulag. Explain how life for Solzhenitsyn, specifically, changed as he was moved from prison to prison.

Essay Topic 2

Throughout his memoir, Solzhenitsyn describes how the Gulag camps compared/contrasted to other famous labor camps through history, most notably the Nazi death camps. Compare/contrast the Gulag camps with the Nazi concentration camps. What was the same about these camps? What was different? Explain why many Westerners have never heard of the Gulag camps and instead have focused all their research on the Nazi concentration camps.

Essay Topic 3

When Stalin took over government power from Lenin in 1929, the definition of government criminals changed drastically. Explain how Lenin had defined his criminals while in power, and compare/contrast the definition to Stalin's. Explaom what constituted being labeled a "counter-revolutionist" under Stalin's rule, and what his punishment for these crimes was.

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