CHILDHOOD IN THE SHADOW OF THE WALLS
CHILDHOOD IN THE SHADOW OF THE WALLS

Summary/Abstract: In times of totalitarianism, the prison walls or the surrounding area of the prison camps have restricted the physical, psychological and ideological freedom of numerous prisoners, either men or women, placing them in an anguishing and dehumanizing space. For women, however, deprivation of liberty by severe detention, either by cell or prison camp means not only physical and mental suffering, but also a suppressed motherhood. This results not only in cases of motherhood removal (women who are taken away from their children by sentencing) but also in a redefinition of the term motherhood (such is the case of the prisoners who give birth in prisons or camps). Therefore, quite often, between cold and wet walls or in the defined area of the camps children are born and grown. This study is proposing to expand this aspect, by pursuing such cases in the Romanian prison space and the Soviet camps of Kolyma, all as a result of the communist times. The main bibliography will be the testimony of Ioana Berindei, I did Jilava in summer shoes [Am făcut Jilava în pantofi de vară, in original], and Evguenia Guinzburg’s memoirs, The sky of Kolyma (The vertigo, vol.2), [Le ciel de la Kolyma (Le vertige, tome 2) in original]. The critical bibliography will have as reference the chapter Women and children of Anne Applebaum study, Gulag, a history.

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