The Journey into the Whirlwind is a first-hand account of an individual, Eugenia Ginzburg, falling victim to the Purges of Stalin. Eugenia Ginzburg is a loyal communist that falls victim to the Purges from the death of Sergey Kirov. The assassination of Kirov brought tension to the Communist party to strengthen its awareness on society. This reaction caused for Ginzburg’s friend, Elvov, to be purged on accounts of Trotskyist ideals in his writings. The connection with Professor Elvov eventually gets Ginzburg arrested. Ginzburg is accused of not turning in Elvov for his ideas that were disapproved against the Communist party. Ginzburg is charged with insufficient vigilance that grants her a release, but is still suspected to interrogations.…show more content… The false accusations were presented in many ways with the series of trails and hearings for Ginzburg on a subject she had no true connection to except that she knew a “Trotskyist”. She is very detailed with the conditions faced during her imprisonment whether it was the crowded train car or the filth in Blake Lake Street. Ginzburg’s factual instances are supported by her statements in the book. The strengths of the book include her examination of symbolic attributes found in the prison and from the past. The symbolism items that Ginzburg sheds to light include food as the means of a gift or a message to her captors of self-strength and a watch she lost the day of her arrest that she found in another prison stopped on the same time. This watch gave her a perspective of the time in between during this horrifying time she had to live through. The criticism of the book is that even though it is a refreshing account of telling the stories of the ones who couldn’t in the prisons, Ginzburg leaves many questions with her storytelling that pertains mostly to her personal struggles. The questions she left out include the outcome of her family and how she was freed from imprisonment. This weakness also captures the true significance of the book to leave out self-interests in favor of her accounts, but information should have been presented to show what happen to her