Cancer Ward

Solzhenitsyn isn't as famous in the 00's as he was in the 70's. There is probably an obvious reason for this, in the 70's the Soviet Union was still alive and apparently well. Now it is gone. So a great number of people who aren't especially interested in history now think Solzhenitsyn is no longer "relevant".

But Cancer Ward is a novel that is still "relevant" even years after the end of the USSR. People still have cancer, still go to hospitals, have surgeries and radiation treatment for cancer, hope they'll get better, get caught up in intra-clinic politics, or try to think about what life all means if they don't make it.

Now I suppose the easy reference works theorize that the disease of cancer in Cancer Ward is a metaphor for the evils of Communism. I think Solzhenitsyn wants us to see a parallel between a body being killed by a tumor, and a nation being killed by Communism, but I don't think cancer is just a metaphor for Communism. I think in the story, Communism is a real issue, and cancer is also a real issue, and both are described openly in the story.