Thursday 4 May 2023

La muerte de Stalin

by Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin
afterword by Jean-Jacques Marie
translated by Unai Velasco

This edition combines both volumes of the original comic. Compared to its film adaptation, the book is more historically accurate. The tragicomic figure of Vasily Stalin is given extra space (and sympathy). Beria’s final internal monologue brings the story to closure — something I felt was missing from the movie.

Apart of practically obligatory “making of”, the bonus material includes some pages created by Thierry Robin in 2008 for his (since abandoned) graphic biography of Stalin.

There is a couple of typos that I’ve noticed. On p. 63, Molotov’s wife is named “Polina Molotovna”; “Molotovna” sounds like a patronymic derived from the (hypothetical) given name “Molotov”. The same spelling is used in the English edition (chapter 2, p. 5), so probably it’s faithfully reproduced from the original comic. I’m sure the author(s) meant “Polina Molotova” although in reality Polina Zhemchuzhina (born Perl Karpovskaya) never took her husband’s surname.

Another error that could be specific for this (Spanish) edition: on pp. 125—127, the placename Zarízino (Царицыно) is consistently used instead of Zarizin (Царицын), former name of Stalingrad.

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