This is a classic World War II war story on par with, Solzhenitsyn’s, “Gulag Archipelago”. “Long Walk” was written in the 50’s, but comes to us at present so clean and sparse it feels almost contemporary (Cormac McCarthy style). And what a perfect timbre for a death march trough Siberia and the Gobi Desert! The story of the Russian Work Camp escape is sensational and needs little adornment. Still, Rawkz adds color and personality to the epic adventure and in doing so elevates it close to the zenith, 5 stars! I have so many questions already piling up about the true tale. Will we ever find out who the American was? Why did they not originally escape on skis? How much time did Rawkz invest in the investigation of the story? Is there a book about the book? Quick, I need to see a map! 8/29/08

Since reading this in 2008, I've stepped into a much heated debate on if the story is a fabrication. I understand that there is a book in the works that answers my curiosity. If the book was lie, what a whopper!

After Germany and Russia partitioned Poland just before World War II made them enemies, the Russians arrested Polish cavalry officer Slavomir Rawicz at his home. Tortured and imprisoned for months, Ramicz was then sent to a slave labor camp in Siberia with a twenty-five year sentence. A few months later and six others escape and set off on a foot trek across southern Russia, the Gobi Desert, and the Himalayan Mountains. I first read this book for the first time about 50 years ago.

I was man almost shorn of identity, ill-fed, abysmally alone, trying to keep alive some spark of resistance in the dank prison atmosphere of studied official loathing and suspicion of me.

This book is riveting. It sucks you in and doesn't let you go. Slavomir Rawicz was captured by the Russians in 1939 during the invasion of Poland and was sent to a labor camp in Siberia. A year later, he and six other prisoners escaped and walked three thousand miles south to India, through Siberia, the Gobi desert, and over the Himalayas.

My only disappointment was his detailed description of a yeti. It brought the validity of the book into question. Which got me to thinking that it was odd that this book was first published in 1956 and none of the other survivors stepped forward. I so want this book to be a true story but I don't think it is. If it were, I'd give it five stars.

Славомир Равич не е авторът на тази книга - това е неговата история за бягството му от лагер 303 на Гулаг и изминатите 6500 км до Индия. Написана от журналистът Роналд Даунинг, историята проследява пътя на Равич и неговите спътници през сибирската тайга, езерото Байкал, пустинята Гоби, прехвърлянето през Хималаи до Индия.
Като един пътепис, величествен и зловещ едновременно.
Изчетох различни коментари по отношение на автентичността на историята, възможно е всичко това да не се е случило точно на Равич, но това не е от значение за мен. Защото това се е случило на едни шестима души, там, между 1939 и 1941 г. Силата, волята, духът са неописуеми. Макар и стилът на писане да не е особено завладяваш, фактът, че това реално е било изпитание за човешката издръжливост, е достатъчно. Знаех в началото, че стигат крайната си цел, но не и без жертви, зверски лишения и физически изпитания. Последното изречение в книгата, макар и с някакъв вариант на щастлив край, е едно от най-тежките, с които някога е свършвала една история. Няма да го цитирам, защото заради него бих прочела книгата отново.
Открих също, че през 2010 "Дългата разходка" е била екранизирана и участват много добри и любими актьори. Планирам скоро да изгледам и филма, надявам се да е хванал духа на преживяното.
Неприятна са пропуските в редакцията, пунктуационни, правописни и т. н. Би било хубаво едно ново издание. И повече популярност на заглавието.

Three star fiction, minus one for claiming to be true.

> The length of chain dragging in the snow at the end of each section of prisoners told the tale of the men who had fallen out on the way. At each death the men behind the vacant space were moved up and the varying lengths of spare chain were an indication of the casualty rate in each group.

> What were they? For years they remained a mystery to me, but since recently I have read of scientific expeditions to discover the Abominable Snowman of the Himalayas and studied descriptions of the creature given by native hillmen, I believe that on that day we may have encountered two of the animals. I do insist, however, that recent estimates of their height as about five feet must be wrong. The minimum height of a well-grown specimen must be around seven feet.

> The bus pulled away towards the transit camp where I was to await a troopship for the Middle East. I looked back at him once and he waved. I felt suddenly bereft of friends, bereft of everything, as desolate and lonely as a man could be.

I read this book three years ago because to me it sounded like the most amazing BALLS-OUT adventure i'd ever heard of... escaping from a Gulag in Siberia (in WINTER!) and then walking across both the Gobi desert and the Himalayas WHAT THE FUCK! The author makes Heinrich Harrer`s (of Seven Years in Tibet fame) Aryan Ass look as tough as Richard Simmons at a spandex sale.

The author purports to complete this adventure at an extremely interesting time in Eurasian history... Russia was in the high times of its socialist shit-show, in which Stalin was chopping up Kulaks like they were cabbage for his evening Shchi. China was in complete chaos with commies, warlords and gangstas all competing to run the show, its most infamous gangsta Lao Che tried to scam Indy out of the remains of Nurhaci, THAT BASTARD! In India Ghandhi was tapping into the great OM and winding up to figuratively TEABAG independence out of the British RAJ. And Nepal was in between everybody just chillin and waiting for WWII to happen so they could unleash the Gurkhas and their khukuris on the Fascists. Rawicz barely touches though on these political, historical and cultural aspects of the regions he was travelling through, because apparently he was too busy surviving giant Gobi snakes, charming lost polish chicks in the Siberian wilds and avoiding yetis. These along with some other stories left me scratching my head and im calling his adventure out as BULLSHIT

So I didn`t know anything about the controversy about the book before I read it, but afterwards his stories, characters and prose left me wondering that at the least maybe he had a bad translator. Let me elaborate(from memory) a couple reasons why I think the story is BULLSHIT...

1) He just happens to run into another Polish escapee in the Siberian wilds, though I guess the NKVD was pretty busy at the time...
2) There is something especially unreal about the dialogues of the people he is travelling with, i'm thinking principally of the Polish chick he travels with. Her dialogue sounds so one dimensional, histrionic and exactly like the BAD characterizations of women some 19th century authors partook in,IM LOOKIN AT YOU JACK LONDON!
3) Just read the section on the snakes in the Gobi desert..
4) The Yeti sighting, again im not saying there isn`t a big cuddly snowmonster in the Himalayas, but the way he introduces and describes the incident seems like just pandering to be sensational.

Overall I don`t want to sound like a stick-in-the-mud killjoy (also incidentally my nickname in high school), people have definitely completed adventures and escapes that are so incredible, that so defy the odds they seem un-real, but they are completely BELIEVABLE (like when I escaped Alcatraz via Jetski and proceeded to Christina Hendricks`s house for quick getaway sex). I`m not saying Rawicz`s story wasn`t possible, but the way he characterizes his companions and the way he conveys the experiences of his journey makes me think that his `Long Walk` was highly unlikely or greatly embellished.

Man bija ļoti grūti noticēt šim stāstam. Ļoti.
Nevaru izskaidrot savu neticību, tā nav īsti racionāla. Bet Sibīrijas sniegi, tuksnesis, Himalaji un vēl sniega cilvēks, nē, veseli divi vairāk kā 6000 km garajā bēgšanas ceļā? Tas ir tik neticami, ka laikam var notikt tikai īstenībā.

Stāsts par izsūtījumu uz Sibīriju latviešiem ir ļoti labi zināms jau pirms šāda žanra grāmatas lasīšanas. Mēs sagaidām brutālu cietsirdību no lielās kaimiņzemes pārstāvjiem un neizmērojamas ciešanas no izsūtītajiem.
Tomēr šī grāmata ir optimisma pilna un pauž milzīgu gribasspēku un dzīvotgribu un drīzāk ierindojama piedzīvojumu grāmatu žanrā. Lai arī grāmatas varoņi piedzīvo to pašu spīdzināšanu, izsūtīšanu un cilvēku salaušanu, tomēr viņi spēj izbēgt, veikt prātam neaptverami grūtu ceļu un izdzīvot (lai arī ne visi). Šīs specifikas dēļ grāmata var šķist neticama.
Tā būtiski atšķiras no daiļliteratūras par izsūtījumiem uz Sibīriju, jo, sacerot grāmatu, autors pasvītro visas šausmas un izvairās no tādām niansēm, kas varētu lasītājam likt domāt, ka "bija izturams". Bet, rakstot grāmatu par paša piedzīvoto, autors lasītājam sniedz savu skatījumu uz notikušo un neviens izsūtītais, kurš notikušo uztvertu, kā nenovēršamas šausmas, nespētu atrast sevī tādu gribasspēku, kādu atrada šis izbēgušo bariņš.

I really want to say - just read it for god sake. However if you are anything like me that will simply put you off :) so...

The story of a Polish officer, caught be the Russians and after extremes of torture, is sentences to 25 years hard labour in Siberia. Simply getting there would probably kill most of us these days however once there he decides to escape. Having decided that east or west will simply lead to them being recaptured, he and a small bunch of companions head south, through Siberia, through the Gobi desert, through Tibet and across the Himalaya to India. It is heart rending and heart warning and one hell of a read - it left me feeling very humble.

This is an unbelievable story and a really interesting read. It's the true story of Slavomir Rawicz' escape with six other men from a Russian prison camp in Siberia during World War II (although there is quite a bit of skepticism about it's validity). Rawicz is Polish, but was captured in Belarus because the Russians feared he was a spy. He was taken to a horrible prison camp nearby for months and then after a formal trial was sentenced to 25 years in a labor camp in Siberia. He was packed in a train with hundreds of other prisoners traveling thousands of miles by train and then on foot in the coldest part of the winter. Of this journey, Rawicz explains, "Behind our flowing beards and our long, matted hair, we were beginning to know one another. It was not a question of names. Names did not count. Nobody bothered with them. Men became identified by character and characteristics. There were the leaders, the organizers, the men who automatically assumed some kind of command to make the rules so that as many as possible might survive (p. 33)." They had very little food, clothing and shelter...and no hope of seeing their families or any kind of normal life again, but it was amazing to see how they helped each other have hope and keep going each day. On Christmas Eve, not long after reaching their new home, "Away back behind us there was suddenly a thin, wavering sound. It was odd and startling. It grew in volume and swept towards us. It was the sound of men singing, men singing with increasing power in the wastes of the Siberian wilderness (p. 54)."

It was unheard of to think of trying to escape, but after just a few months in the camp Rawicz and a few others starting stashing away some food and making some extra clothes to plan for an escape. Miraculously they were able to disappear at night when there was enough snow coming down to cover their tracks. They set off without a map, but with the plan to head south towards India. They were met with challenges, but it's really rather remarkable how well they fared. They were extremely carefully the whole time they were still in Russia to avoid any other people and being captured. Not long before reaching the Russian border they met a young girl trying to escape as well. She joined their group and did amazingly well in keeping up and helping their spirits. They continued walking day after day and month after month, often with little food. They reached Mongolia and Tibet. They found the Mongols to be "whatever their station in life," to be courteous, trusting, generous and hospitable. They would always give them food and a place to stay when they came across them and bid them "continuing health for their feet (p. 161)." The

"We had no maps and there was no one to tell us. I have tried in recent years by reference to maps to plot our probable course, but the probable could err from the actual by as much as a hundred miles (p. 154)." I really am amazed that they could keep walking day after day with so little and even less knowledge of where they were going for sure. And that they seemed to keep us as good of spirits as they did is remarkable! "In the shadow of death we grew closer together than ever before. No man would admit to despair. No man spoke of fear. The only thought spoken out again and again was that there must be water soon (p. 193)." Some died along their journey, but they were helping each other so positively and hopefully for as long as they could. I was inspired by their examples of endurance and kindness and selflessness throughout so much hardship. They were thinking about what to give and how to help those along their way that helped them. Very neat!

"With the coming morning the outlook was always more hopeful. Fear remained, a lurking thing, but movement and action and the exercise of the mind on the daily problems of existence pushed it into the background. We were now, more strongly than ever, in the grip of the compulsive urge to keep moving. It had become an obsession, a form of mania. Like automatons we set out each morning, triggered off by a quiet "Let's go" from one or another of us. No one ever pleaded for half-an-hour's respite. We just went, walking the stiffness out of our joints and the chill of the dark hours from our bodies (p. 246)."

After nearly 18 months of walking everyday they reached India and were safe. It was unimaginable. They did't even know what to do with themselves once they were done walking. I can't imagine what a mind game it must have been to keep going under these circumstances. Whether or not all of this is true or not, I was inspired by the story and examples of these travelers and those that helped them. It seemed to bring the world and people together, even in the midst of horrible and hopeless circumstances.

I expected this book to be quite a few things. Inspirational. Moving. Inspirational.

Unfortunately it fell short of the great storey that it could have been and that I thought it would be. I found that everything went too smoothly and there lacked a degree of suspense and emotion that I was expecting.

There is a lot of debate over whether this story is true or not. Regardless of whether I had picked this book up in the fiction or non-fiction section would not influence my rating. Whether this storey was fact or fiction, I had no connection to the characters, did not really care what happened and had to force myself to finish.

Great premises. Execution not so great.

This is the true story of 7 men who were unjustly imprisoned in communist Russia during WWII. They escaped from a Russian prison in Siberia and traveled over 4000 miles on foot to freedom in British ruled India. The story is fascinating and heart wrenching. The conditions that they traveled through were beyond comprehension. They escaped in the middle of a Siberian winter, traveled through a desert in Southern Mongolia, crossed the Himalayan mountains. They were starving and broken. There were so many times when I thought that there is no way a person could possibly live through this. I am amazed by the human desire for survival and freedom, and the incredible drive it gives that could allow a person to live through such harrowing and unthinkable experiences. I couldn't put it down. I felt like the book ended a bit abruptly and I was a little disappointed we didn't get any more information about where their lives took them after this experience. But it is an amazing and inspirational story. I loved what the author said in his afterword, "What is most important is that freedom is like oxygen, and I hope 'The Long Walk' is a reminder that when lost, freedom is difficult to regain."