SOURCE: Sukhikh, Igor'. “About Stars, Blood, People, and Horses.” Russian Studies in Literature 37, no. 1 (winter 2000-2001): 6-26.

In the following essay, Sukhikh offers a thematic and stylistic examination of Red Cavalry and chronicles the writing of the book, which he asserts happened in “three steps, over three stages of transformation of the raw material of life into a work of art.”

In the seventh year of the new era (a.d. 1924), Army Commander Budennyi, “having rode into literature on horseback, and criticizing it from the height of his horse” (Gorky), discovered that serving under his command was a slanderer, sadist, and literary degenerate: citizen Babel'.

Under the fine-sounding, patently speculative title, “Iz knigi Konarmiia” [from the book Red Cavalry], the hapless author has attempted to depict the life, mores, and traditions of the First Cavalry Army during the hectic period of its heroic struggle on the Polish and...