Remembering Communist Violence The Bulgarian Gulag and the Conscience of the West

This article problematizes the rhetorical appropriations of memories of violence by focus-ing on a collection of narratives of former labor camp inmates in communist Bulgaria. The collection, published in the United States in 1999 under the title Voices From the GULAG: Life and Death in Communist Bulgaria, was edited and introduced by Tzvetan Verdery, 1999; Verdery, 1996), yet this task is complicated by the emergence into personal accounts of the atrocities commit-of former prisoners of internment camps are political violence under communism. As Humphrey (2002) has observed, “atrocity produces a legacy of individual suffering g and healing ” (p. 1). for his invaluable insights and sup-anonymous reviewers for their kind uld be addressed to Nadia Kaneva, do at Bwhich itself remains a political resource for both reinjurin Author’s Note: The author is grateful to Professor Gerard A. Hauser port in writing this article. She also thanks the JCI editors and the two and productive comments. Correspondence concerning this article sh