Everything Flows by Vasily Grossman

irritated look in his eyes, whatever their color. Someone has always just stepped on his toes; there is invariably someone he has to settle accounts with.
    For him the State’s passion for unmasking enemies of the people is a blessing. It is like a steady trade wind blowing over the ocean, a gracious following wind filling his small yellow sail. And at the price of the suffering of those he destroys, he gets what he needs: additional living space, a salary increase, a neighbor’s hut, a suite of Polish furniture, a little garden, a heated garage for his
Moskvich
car...
    He despises books, music, the beauty of nature, love, and maternal tenderness. He wants objects, only objects.
    But even he is not moved exclusively by material considerations. He is extremely touchy; his grievances fester inside him.
    He will denounce a colleague who has made him jealous by dancing with his wife, a wit who has made fun of him during a meal, even just someone from the communal apartment who has accidentally knocked into him in the kitchen.
    He has two distinguishing features. First, he is a volunteer. No one frightened him into it; he writes denunciations of his own accord. Second, what he sees in a denunciation is the direct, definite material benefit that he can derive from it.
    Nevertheless, let us restrain the fist that has been raised to strike him: his passion for objects is a passion born of poverty. Yes, he could tell you about a room eight meters square that is home to eleven people, where a paralyzed man is snoring while a young couple rustles and moans beside him, where an old woman is muttering a prayer and a child who has wet himself keeps crying and crying. He could tell you about greenish-brown village bread made with ground-up leaves, and about a staple Moscow soup, made from frozen potatoes that were being sold off cheap, that he used to have three times a day.
    He could tell you about a house without a single beautiful object; about chairs with plywood seats; about tumblers made of thick, murky glass; about tin spoons and two-pronged forks; about underwear that has been mended many times over; about a dirty rubber raincoat that he had worn, in December, over a torn quilted jacket.
    He could tell you about waiting for a bus on a dark winter morning, about the unimaginable crush in the tram after a night spent in a desperately cramped room.
    It was, surely, living an animal life that had first engendered his animal passion for things, his longing for a more spacious den. The bestiality of his life had turned him into a beast.
    Yes, yes, of course. But it is clear that he lived no worse than others. It is clear, in fact, that he lived better than many.
    And these many, many others did not do what he did. Let us take our time; let us think—and only then pronounce judgment.
    Prosecutor
: Do you all confirm that you wrote denunciations against Soviet citizens?
    Informers
: Yes, in a way.
    Prosecutor
: Do you admit that you are guilty of the deaths of innocent Soviet people?
    Informers
: No, we categorically deny it. The State had already doomed these people. Our work was, one might say, cosmetic. It served to keep up appearances. Essentially, whatever we wrote and however we wrote it, whether we accused or defended them, these people were already doomed.
    Prosecutor
: But sometimes you wrote denunciations out of your own free will. In such cases, you yourselves chose the victim.
    Informers
: Our freedom of choice was only apparent. People were destroyed according to statistical methods. Those who belonged to particular social and ideological strata were scheduled for extermination. We were well aware of those parameters—and so were you. We never informed against members of social strata that were healthy and not already marked for destruction.
    Prosecutor
: Or in the words of the new gospel: “Push that which is falling!” Nevertheless, there were occasions, even during the harshest of times, when the State