Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn has died.

A man that spoke truth to power has left this plane...From the NYT website:

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, whose stubborn, lonely and combative literary struggles gained the force of prophecy as he revealed the heavy afflictions of Soviet Communism in some of the most powerful works of fiction and history written in the 20th century, died late Sunday in Russia, his son Yermolai said early Monday in Moscow. He said the cause was a heart condition. He was 89.

He outlived by nearly 17 years the state and system he had battled through years of imprisonment, ostracism and exile. (emphasis mine)

His monumental book The Gulag Archipelago, exposed the heinous and horrifying prison system to which millions of Russians were sent to and ultimately died within their walls. Rest in peace sweet man.