In 2009 Yannick Haenel and François Meyronnis published Prélude à la délivrance (Prelude to deliverance) gathering numerous conversations and essays about Varlam Shalamov, Paul Celan and the topic of resurrection in the novel Moby Dick.
One was introduced by Varlam Shalamov in his tales about Gulag, and it was called "calf" - a younger convict accepted to escape team for food, as a walking piece of meat.
An autobiographical movie about Varlam Shalamov was directed by Alexandra Sviridova.
The river gives its title to a famous anthology about life in Gulag camps by Varlam Shalamov, The Kolyma Tales.
His immersion in samizdat literature at this time brought him into contact with the works of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Varlam Shalamov and Robert Conquest.