Zinky Boys (30 page)

*
Nur Mohammed Taraki (1917—79) led a new government set up in 1978 by the Marxist People's Democratic Party, only to become the victim of a coup in the following year.

†
Presumably he had in mind Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko etc.

Copyright © 1990 by Svetlana Alexievich
Translation copyright © 1992 by Julia and Robin Whitby
Introduction copyright © by Larry Heinemann
First American Edition 1992

Zinky Boys
was first published in the Soviet Union in 1990.
Its original Russian title is

All rights reserved

The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:

Alexievich, Svetlana.

[TSinkovye mal'chiki. English]

Zinky boys : Soviet voices from a forgotten war / Svetlana
Alexievich ; translated by Julia and Robin Whitby.
p. cm.

1. Afghanistan—History—Soviet occupation, 1979–1989—Personal
narratives. 2. Soldiers—Soviet Union—Biography. I. Title.
DS371.2.A4513   1992

ISBN: 978-0-393-33686-3

eISBN: 978-0-393-25445-7 (e-book)

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