A Piece of Meat, The Snake Charmer Summary

A Piece of Meat

Golubev is a political prisoner with a comfortable staff job. He fears being thrown back into hard labor and death when the year end "commission" comes to the area. The commission examines whether political prisoners are in soft jobs not permitted to them. The commission officers throw out the political prisoners from their jobs if they are on the list. Golubev sees a case where a man is sent back to the mining camps and his likely death. If the man had an attack of appendicitis, he could have avoided being sent to hard labor. Golubev, several months later, is ordered to go on the bus back to the camps. He fakes an attack of appendicitis. An operation is done to take out the little organ, a...