A graphic memoir.
Written by Luba and Eugene Ostashevsky.
Illustrated by Igor Karash.
To read the graphic novel click here
Our project is a graphic novel about our grandfather, Victor Torkanovsky, who served in the Soviet Army during WWII. It recounts Victor's experiences from 1941, when he signed up to serve at the war's outbreak; to his participation in two major battles: the defense of Leningrad and the battle of Stalingrad; to his service in Central Asia and in Ukraine, where he visits his family home. He began the war as a gangly university student with bottle thick glasses and emerged as a hardened soldier.
Our grandfather was one of tens of millions traumatized by the war. Researching his story made us see the war's toll on people. Victor nearly starved to death; he experienced aerial bombardment and was shot; he watched his friends die. He was also thrust into morally compromising situations: drafted into the NKVD (secret police), he was forced to arrest his childhood nanny as well as shoot people suspected of being saboteurs. In Central Asia, during the Kalmyk rebellion, he captured German prisoners and executed them. Interviewing him, we saw how deeply he still felt the events of the war, even 65 years later, with feelings of deep remorse and sadness.
If he had lived in the west, he would have been able to talk about his experiences openly. However, in the Soviet Union, veterans' narratives were eclipsed by official propaganda and many took their secrets to their graves.
We hope that our rendering of Victor's service can shed light on real events and bring the tough reality of what that generation experienced to the attention of young people today, who know little about it and are not prone to reading lengthy historical volumes. This is why we chose the medium of a graphic novel. We hope that its visual and succinct approach can transport readers back and provide a vivid and memorable story to which they can relate and from which they can learn.