The Fifth Seal

The Fifth Seal, written in 1938 by Mark Aldanov, a Russian in exile, is a novel of character and ideas. Aldanov writes of what happens when the Soviet Ambassador to France and his entourage, all indoctrinated to varying degrees with Soviet dogma, arrive in France. These Russians —the Ambassador afraid for his position, the Czarist general turned comrade, the secret service agent, the young female secretary brought up in Communism — undergo a sea-change in Paris. Each character has three separate reactions to the life there. Outwardly and diplomatically they patronizingly accept the situation; inwardly and Sovietly they think it decadent, but still further inwardly and humanly they know it is attractive. Each one must keep his enjoyment of Paris to himself, for he does not know which of his associates is a spy. The tension becomes unbearable, and each seeks an escape. This clinical, penetrating study of souls and ideas in flux cannot be read casually, for the harmonies are too complex and the overtones too many.