Mikhail Sholokhov’s "Wormhole," a summary Automatic translate

The tragic story of a Cossack family vividly illustrates the ideological divide in a village during the early years of Soviet rule. Written in 1926, the conflict between fathers and sons reaches its peak due to the material interests of the older generation, who are willing to commit murder to protect their property. The work is part of the author’s early prose series "Don Stories." The books in this series are united by the theme of class struggle and the destruction of the traditional way of life of the Don Cossacks.

The family of Yakov Alekseevich

Yakov Alekseevich is a stooped, broad-boned old man with a beard like a new millet broom. In the summer, he goes barefoot, wearing only a beltless canvas shirt. Recently, the village council considered him a true kulak. The old man showed cunning: he fired his hired laborer, sold his extra pair of oxen, and moved into the middle peasant category. Yet, he retained his dignified bearing, the manners of a wealthy man, and a sedate manner. In the spring, the owner sowed 21.8 hectares of wheat and, with the money saved, bought agricultural equipment from needy neighbors: a ploughshare, iron harrows, and a winnowing machine.

His youngest son, Styopka, had joined the Komsomol without permission. Yakov Alekseevich decided not to punish the young man right away. He hoped that constant ridicule and vitriolic abuse would make his son come to his senses. Styopka stopped crossing himself and began looking at his father with wild eyes. During a family dinner, with hot cabbage soup steaming on the table and the smell of fresh bread in the air, Yakov Alekseevich harshly reprimanded his son. He compared the young man to a bull that defecates where it eats. Styopka silently slid to the table, but the atmosphere in the house grew tense.

Fraternal conflict

The eldest son, Maxim, was a strong twenty-nine-year-old Cossack. In the evenings, he carved wooden spoons and pestered Styopka with questions. Maxim mocked the new government, believing it was only useful to factory workers. He recalled with nostalgia his service during the First World War, when the company commander, Bokov, ordered the flogging of striking factory workers near Moscow. Maxim laughingly described his rawhide whip with a bullet in it. He boasted about knocking down a frail, gray-haired old man, and how the horses then trampled twenty women.

Styopka called his brother a dog and Cain. In response, Maxim lunged at him, pinned him to the bed, and began methodically beating him in the face with his rough palm. Styopka spat blood in Maxim’s face, involuntary tears streaming from his eyes, but the young man couldn’t break free. Yakov Alekseevich calmly bided his time and separated his sons. He fully supported Maxim. Styopka wiped his bloody lips and left silently. The next morning, he decided to bear the insult and did not go to the local council to complain.

Spring work and alienation

Spring arrived swiftly in the village. The snow melted, the steppe turned green, and the willows budded. Yakov Alekseevich had begun feeding his oxen corn since Maslenitsa. He sent his sons out to plow in mid-March. They traveled 8.5 kilometers from home. The nights were bitterly cold, the grass was covered with frost, and the ground didn’t thaw until midday. The oxen quickly became exhausted, steam billowing from their backs. Maxim scolded his father for working too early, threatening to ruin the cattle. Yakov Alekseevich merely scraped the plowshare and forced Styopka to urge the exhausted animals on.

The family had completely abandoned their youngest son. They avoided him as if he were a contagious patient. Yakov Alekseyevich openly called Styopka a worm that needed to be mercilessly cut out of a tree. Styopka felt a searing shame for his father, who was ruining the poor. At night, the young man was tormented by recurring nightmares. He dreamed of strangers burying him alive in the steppe beneath a sandy ridge overgrown with snakeweed, burying his chest with heavy lumps of icy clay. Styopka would wake up with chattering teeth, unable to catch his breath for a long time.

Haymaking and the poor man’s request

It was haymaking time. Yakov Alekseevich quickly mowed his plot. At night, he and Maxim would secretly travel beyond the village’s boundaries and mow other people’s grass. The old man had amassed a huge stock of hay, raking it high. He planned to profitably sell the feed to his starving neighbors in the winter or early spring, taking their last heifers.

On Saturday, after dark, an emaciated, poor man named Prokhor Tokin came to them. Prokhor wore torn sack trousers, and his bare feet were dripping with blood. His slanted black eyes glowed dully in their deep sockets. The poor man begged Yakov Alekseevich to give him oxen for one day to transport hay before the holiday. The old man flatly refused. Styopka saw Prokhor’s knees trembling with weakness, turned pale, and loudly demanded the animals. Yakov Alekseevich reluctantly agreed, but forced Prokhor to promise to work for a whole week for free during the upcoming threshing.

Meeting and Exposure

Early Sunday morning, the police officer called the Cossacks to a meeting at the school. A red-bearded statistician arrived to record crops and calculate taxes. Yakov Alekseevich ordered Styopka to hurry with Prokhor to get hay, then ordered his son to put on his holiday trousers and accompany him. The old man hoped that his Komsomol status would help him get a discount. The school was packed with Cossacks.

At the meeting, the statistician asked Yakov Alekseevich about the area under crops. The old man squinted, began counting on his fingers, and pretended to count wedges. He publicly lied, claiming he had only planted 7.63 hectares. Styopka squeezed his way to the table and loudly corrected his father. He gave the exact figure — 21.8 hectares. The crowd of Cossacks cheered, catching the kulak in his lie. Yakov Alekseevich’s lips trembled in confusion, and he tried to excuse himself by blaming his forgetfulness. The statistician crossed out the old figure and wrote in the new data in a thick pencil.

The disappearance of the bulls

Styopka ran out of the school and rushed toward Prokhor. They quickly rolled out the carts, harnessed the oxen, and drove out of the yard. Yakov Alekseevich, returning from the meeting in a frenzy, tried to stop them. He ran after the carts, waving his cap and shouting in a hoarse voice. Styopka ordered Prokhor not to look back and pulled hard on his whip. The carts plunged into the ravine and disappeared.

The friends reached Prokhor’s haystacks, unharnessed the oxen, and let them graze in the mown area. After loading the carts with hay, they spent the night in the steppe. Prokhor fell asleep right there on the cart, and Styopka lay down on the dew-damp ground. Before dawn, Prokhor fell from the cart and discovered the oxen were missing. They wandered the steppe in despair until evening, searching a 10.6-kilometer radius. They scoured every gulch and ravine, but the animals had vanished without a trace. A haggard Prokhor and a dejected Styopka returned to the carts.

Bloody massacre

After lunch, Yakov Alekseevich and Maxim rode out into the steppe in a cart. From a distance, Maxim noticed the boys sitting by the carts and realized the oxen were gone. The old man assumed his son and the poor man had secretly sold the cattle to merchants. The cart raced up to the carts. Maxim jumped off and screamed, accusing Styopka of ruining the family.

Yakov Alekseevich ran and hit the pale Styopka, knocking him to the ground. The old man, mad with rage, threatened to rip out his son’s goiter and demanded that he confess to conspiring with the merchants. Meanwhile, Maxim knocked Prokhor down and began brutally beating him in the stomach and head with his heavy boots. Prokhor moaned softly, covering his face with his hands.

Maxim snatched a pitchfork from the cart, hoisted the poor man to his feet, and quietly demanded a confession. Prokhor burst into tears, thick, bluish-black blood flowing from his mouth onto his shirt. He moaned piteously, "Brother! Don’t sin…" Maxim calmly plunged the iron teeth of the pitchfork into the poor man’s chest, just under his left nipple.

Styopka thrashed desperately on the dew-soaked ground, arching his back. He tried to kiss his father’s hands, finding the swollen veins with his lips. Yakov Alekseevich pinned his son to the ground with his whole body and hoarsely commanded Maxim, "Hit him in the heart…"

Return of the Killers

The murderers returned home in pitch darkness. Yakov Alekseevich lay face down the entire way, his head thumping dully against the bottom of the cart as it rutted. Before reaching the village, Maxim dropped the reins and matter-of-factly brushed the dust from his pants. He proposed a cold-blooded plan to his father. They would tell the neighbors that they had found Styopka and Prokhor already dead. According to their version, unknown robbers had taken the oxen and killed the boys. Yakov Alekseevich listened to his son and remained silent.

Maxim’s pregnant wife met them at the gate. Aksinya lazily scratched her sagging belly. She yawned widely, crossed her lips, and indifferently informed the men that they had wasted their time driving the horse into the steppe. The missing bulls had returned home on their own some time ago. The woman lazily inquired if Styopka had stayed behind to look for the cattle, and without waiting for an answer, hobbled heavily into the house.