5 comments about A Concise History of the Russian Revolution.

1. This book is an abridged version of two much longer books Pipes has written (RUSSIA UNDER THE OLD REGIME and RUSSIA UNDER THE BOLSHEVIK REGIME). And it feels abridged. On many topics, I wanted more details, and there was a lack of endnotes. However, the details and VERY extensive endnotes are found in the extended volumes. It was written in a very matter-of-fact manner, without much narrative flair.
   
   Which is why I find it suprising how I was nearly moved to tears on more than one occasion. This has to be one of the saddest stories in history. How one of the largest nations on Earth could be subjegated by a pack of dillusional intellectuals and then terrorized by the most brutal regime the world has ever seen should scare us all.
   
   Pipes's longer book (of which this is the abridged version) is one of many recent histories, including Service's LENIN, and many Russian language histories, to utilize the many Soviet documents made available since the collapse of the USSR. An examination of the primary historical record only makes the Bolsheviks look worse than we thought.
   
   This should be a must read for all. That there are still Communists and fellow-travellers out there with all we have recently learned of the Soviet regime is a stunning indictment of the failure of our educational system.



2. I am not an expert but have read a fair amount about the Russian Revolution and Stalinism. This history by Pipes lays responsibility exactly where I think it belongs. There were many issues in this complex mix of cultures, motives, challenges and histories. I do believe that the root cause of the horrendous cruelty Russians inflicted on themselves was hatred and power and I think this one the ideas in this book. Mayber this is simplistic of me but there is no evidence in the history of the period and its people that love of Russia or the well-being of its people was ever considered by Lenin or Trotsky. I think that it's great that Pipes lays this bare using historical facts. Even if Pipes is biased against them, the results of the Russian revolution speak for themselves --- a destroyed economy built on a holocaust of slave labor and the psychic destruction of a people, especially the Russian man.
   
   The last chapter is an absolutely superb summary, especially the point that the main challenge of serfs was not their oppression but it was their isolation. It's a very very interesting and sublte interpretation of different driving causes in Russian revolution far beyond what I could describe.
   
   Well worth the time to read.



3. This book is Richard Pipes own consolidation and abridgement of his two masterworks, "Russian Revolution" (1990) and "Russia under the Bolshevik Regime" (1994). The two volumes total 1,300 pages supported by 4,500 references.
   
   The "Concise History" redaction is 406 pages and includes a glossary, chronology, one page of references, and a very good index. It also has 76 photos and five maps. Although it is a work of impeccable scholarship, it is also highly readable and accessible to the average reader.
   
   Pipes is a virtuoso historian and perhaps the greatest chronicler of Russian history of all time. If you decide to read this history, you will learn a great deal about the most important event of the 20th Century (which spanned the two World Wars), and certainly the greatest experiment in utopian social engineering ever. In the process you will gain an extensive knowledge about the greatest foe the United States faced in the last Century, and how that foe came to its defeat.
   
   Pipes concludes that "the Russian Revolution appears as the unfolding of a tragedy in which events follow with inexorable force from the mentality and character of the protagonists." And his lifetime of study of these events has left him "...less sanguine about humanity's capacity to change itself."
   
   Recommended companion read: Aleksander Zolzhenitsyn's "The Gulag Archipelago 1918-1956," HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 2002. This is a one volume abridgement by Zolzhenitsyn from the original seven volumes, which have now been remaindered.



4. There are boring books about history, but there is no boring history, according to Richard Pipes. I understand him to believe that what happens matters; that life is significant. (Something many modern historians seem none too sure about.) History carries meaning and its dynamism affects us in the present and on the other side of the world. With this level of respect and sensitivity he approaches his subject. And so this book--albeit of a difficult subject matter--is a pleasure to read.
   
   Pipe's approach helps the reader to stay open to discoveries and insights about what may be considered the "Red Elephant" in the room. The "Red Elephant" is a topic we can no longer avoid and yet still hope to progress in the worldview often simply called "modernity." Even though the proper care and role of capitalism is highly contested in our day, denial of the deeper realizations to be gleaned from this socialist experiment is not an option.
   
   Pipes emphasizes the uniqueness of Russia throughout his study. Only by deeply and thoroughly understanding Russia can we truly weigh the behavior of the Revolution's actors, or should I say bullies and beasts. That this history is ugly and deeply disturbing is an understatement.
   
   To understand the uniqueness of the Russian monarch, the Tsar, necessitates understanding the uniqueness of the Russian peasants. This is the central duality that the Bolsheviks had to contend with. Neither fit into Marx's Hegelian critique, the central player of which was supposed to be the proletariat--only 1% of the population, and only a tiny percentage of this 1% were ever central players.
   
   Pipes challenges the conventional view adopted uncritically from the Enlightenment of the "oppressed" peasants who simply need to be freed from monarch, church, and all other authorities, and modernism will triumph. Actually the main problem for the peasants was they were in their own world, isolated from education and technology and were a law and society onto themselves, with no real political or national awareness.
   
   Surprisingly, peasants "owned" 9/10 of the arable land--but communally, not individually. They believed that all the rest of the land was their due from God, and, through the Tsar, soon to be totally theirs--revolution or not. A humorous note: the peasants looked down on city dwellers and men without beards.
   
   Everyone seemed to be terrified of the peasants partly because they were 80 percent of the population and were taxed but barely communicated with or even acknowledged. They often rebelled, and are described as Hobbesian anarchist--without respect for law; yet they often responded with an attitude of fatalism--understandably so since edicts would drop down on them out of nowhere. (This did not change with the Revolution.)
   
   The peasants were the wild card for the Revolutionaries. Everyone wished they would just go away; they didn't fit the formula. Whether they were destined for the Gulag or not very much depended on where they lived. Those in the wealthier bread-basket areas could and would be considered by the Bolsheviks petty bourgeoisie or kulaks, peasants with some ownership interests, capitalists, hence "enemies of the people"--believe it or not. Their socialistic traditions of always breaking up the land and sharing equally in everything kept anyone from really developing a strong system of agriculture for even one generation. (Orlando Figes' book, "A People's Tragedy," fleshes out peasant life with numerous fascinating examples, and I highly recommend it.)
   
   The Bolsheviks would not be stopped merely by reality, but rather forced reality into their Marxist critique or changed the critique as they took control. Pipes seems to give Marx more of a pass than I would, in terms of responsibility for crazy thinking masquerading as scientific reason.
   
   A belief in history as inexorable was at the heart of the Marxist-Leninism ideology. In his chapter "Spiritual Life," Pipes describes this belief as a primitive faith rooted in much deeper layers of human psychology than the relatively recent traditions and beliefs the Bolsheviks sought, in the name of modernity, to utterly eradicate. In seeking to deny and escape faith, the Revolutionaries became a fanatical example of what they hated.
   
   Though I cannot agree with the author's conservation politics and economics--conclusions he may have drawn from his studies--nevertheless, his writing should be challenged only on its truth and rigor: He leaves you plenty of room to draw your own conclusions.
   
   Dr. Pipes seems to apologize for his emotional responses and judgments--highly educated as they obviously are. But I think he simply is not willing to check his humanity at the door when seeking to understand and interpret a subject that is central to the health and development of modern thought. He is leading the way not just to an educated scientific understanding of the events of the Russian Revolution, but to a wise and deeply human one.



5. To read this book you have to understand what was happening around the world at that time and if you did not, well this book will put you in the right state of mind. The Russian Revolution, the single event that changed world history is well chronicled here by the excellent author Richard Pipes. The author is inspired and writes the great history of the events, that lead to this event.
   
   This book is not hard to read as it fallows a good order and explains all of the people involved in the events. A pitful Bolshevik party, who no one took seriously even as they took over the goverment. People thought they would also be expedited soon by another goverment but it was not so. As Lenin, who is described well in this book put to work his new system of taking over, treating politics as War. Using that doctrine he cunningly destroyed the opposition and won Russia for himself and the party.
   
   For those of us who do not understand what the "paradise on Earth" really was, Pipes explains it all to us and how it failed. The people who this system wanted to represent did not even want the system, in fact no one really wanted it they just wanted an end to the Tsar and the war which Lenin gave but no one thought ahead. Witness the tragedy that was the revolution and how intellectuals given the drive and power can turn a society into terror. If you are interested on reading more on Comminism, also read by the author his review on that subject on the World Chronicles books.

3 comments about The Russian Civil War.

1. Among the innumerable books and essays on the Russian Civil War, this is by far the best book to start with. It's reasonably short, very readable, has helpful maps, and an excellent bibliography. It's one of the few books to present a coherent, unified account of an extremely complex and messy historical episode. Best of all, Mawdsley, who is (or at least was until recently) a professional historian at the University of Glasgow, writes his book without basing it on any particular political viewpoint, whereas the great majority of books on the Russian Civil War have an axe to grind. In order to keep the book readable and reasonably short, Mawdsley omits a great deal of important information; for the reader who wants to delve further, Volume Two of William Henry Chamberlin's `The Russian Revolution, 1917 - 1921' originally published in 1934, is still the book to read next after Mawdsley.

   Unfortunately, Mawdsley's book is out of print and seems to be hard to come by. However, a determined book search can locate a copy, or of course your local library can get a copy on interlibrary loan. I wish it was back in print.




2. This book is a light and quick read for an overview of the Russian Civil War for someone new to the subject. It is somewhat difficult to follow as the author jumps around in time as if he never came to grips with how to organize his material. The maps are less than emlightening, are too general, and do not aid the reader's comprehension. I was often searching the maps in vain to locate a city or town the author was referencing in the text. I finally had to make do with a map of the Soviet Union I had in my possession.
   
   Interestingly, the author essentially omits the American participation in the intervention at Arkhangelsk, but that is probably to be expected from a British author.
   
   Somehow the reader is left with the feeling that he hasn't read enough to understand the dynamics of the Russian Civil War, other to realize that the Bolsheviks were better organized than the Whites, much more monolithically directed and coordinated, and that the control of Moscow and the heartland of Russia proved decisive for the Reds. That could have been done in half the space, but a comprehensive treatment would require a tome of over a thousand pages. Personally I would like to see the author produce that tome with numerous maps.



3. The Russian Civil War of 1917-1920 was a very complicated affair, covering vast stretches of Russian territory, and numerous armies, armored trains (as in"Doctor Zhivago"), and almost untold numbers of names of people involved. This book is fairly well written, but it does get plodding on more than one occasion, which isn't surprising, given what I've mentioned above. My chief fault with this book is that it tends to assume that the reader has quite a bit of familiarity with the era, the people involved and certain instances(such as the "Ice March"). If you're simply a general reader seeking to find out what happened, you're going to get more than a bit confused. The author tries to cram too much detail into too little space, and that hurts the book overall. For a more reader friendly work on the same topic, read the book by W. Bruce Lincoln, "Red Victory".

5 comments about The White Guard.

1. Bulgakov, while not as well known as most of his russian predecessors, is an exceptional writer. this novel, which covers only a short period of time immediately after world war I and before the bolshevik revolt, tells of the turbin family and their life in kiev. this aristocrat family has stong ties to tsarist russia and are caught between the retreating germans and the approaching socialists.
   
   the turbins join the white guard to help defend their homeland. the war is portrayed with all of its horrors. there are heroes and villians. neighbors come closer together as the inevitable end comes nearer. civilization begins to collapse as the socialists enter the city cheered on by the common people.
   
   bulgakov makes the reader feel the fear and the horror as only one could who has lived through the experience.
   
   an excellent example of modern russian literature.



2. What i loved most about it (i'm Russian myself) was the poetry with which Bulgakov infused every line of the novel. The language seems to give it a certain timeless quality, and at times a heartwrenching beauty..
   I just looked at the excerpt from this translation and it seems to be pretty good. I'd recommend the edition to anyone.



3. From the language used to the references about government, politics and religion, you would think that this book was written about current times. But it is written about one of the most unknown parts of the Communist take- over in Russia following the first world war.
   
   After the fall of the Russian Empire and the deposing of the Tsar in February 1917, and then the October Revolution in 1917; many of the constituent parts of the Empire opted for independence. Most people know of the creation of Finland, the Baltic States and Poland, and even about the civil war between the whites and the reds. What is not normally known is that the Ukraine declared itself an independent republic at the same time. Unfortunately for the Ukrainians, no one recognized them.
   
   Actually two Ukraines were declared, one in Austrian Galicia (Western Ukraine) which was swallowed up by the Poles under Polsudski, and another based in Kiev. The one in Kiev was originally allied with the German Army who had signed a peace accord with the Reds at Brest-Litovsk, that included much of the land around Kiev. The German's saw this area as a protectorate and placed it under the control of 'Hetman' Shchnolpolsky and the Rada (Parliment). This is the group that was backed by the "White Guard" made up of Tsarist officers and cadets from the local military academies.
   
   As the story begins we are introduced to the Turbins, Alexi, Elena and Nikolta. Alexi was a doctor in the Tsarist army, Elena's huband was a colonel and Niki was a cadet. In a short period of time they are visited by some old friends who are also ex-officers. But Germany has now been declared a Republic and the German Army is leaving. So too does the Hetman and most of his cronies. Elena's husband is also on the run. Alexi and Niki and their friends have all joined the Guards. But with the break down of the Hetman group, another group under General Petlyura (a cossack leader) has declared themselves head of the Ukrainin People's Republic (they are actually called Greens and fought under the Blue and Gold banner of modern Ukraine).
   
   Most of Petlyura's soldiers are from the ranks of the old tsarist army and they hate the "officers" of the White Guard almost (if not more) than they do the Bolshvik 'Reds'. What we witness is the divided loyalties or the upper classes (officers) and the 'normal' people who just want to go on with their lives (and will cheer anyone they have to as liberators).
   
   Though this book was not published until 1967, as the play "Days of the Turbins", was a big favorite in the Soviet Union (and was supposedly seen by Stalin fifteen times) though Bulgakov was not allowed to publish any of his material after 1920.
   
   The White Guard is not the White Army, which later kicked out Petlyura, under General Deniken, who was subsequently defeated by the Red Army under Trotzky in the Crimea and had to abandon Russia in 1921. For those who know the history of the 'famine' in the Ukraine in 1922-23, this story will give them more understanding of why Stalin allowed so many people to starve to death (he could never trust their loyalty).



4. bulgakov may have written master and margarita and black snow, both bizarre quirky novels, but white guard is undoubtedly the most human.
   moving and touching it pulls at the heartstrings with its complexities of family relations and social environment.
   beautiful



5. This was an excellent Russian novel set in 1918 Kiev. It follows the Turbins, a Tsarist middle class family in hiding. It is the end of WWI, and the Bolshevik Revolution is taking hold in Moscow. As loyalists to the Russian crown, the Turbins and friends are on the run from not only the Bolsheviks, but also the fierce Ukranian nationalist movement which is equally threatening. In fact, the Bolsheviks are still far away at Moscow, while the nationalists are much closer to home, and thus more of a direct threat. It is the story of a proud and pious people whose era is coming to an end. There is treachery around every corner, as the Turbins despairingly watch their beloved city of Kiev fall to the enemy. The prose is excellent, and the story is at once sad, humorous, and tragic. It is a pleasure to read and although fictional, I would consider it a good snapshot of the Russian Revolution, told from the perspective of the losing side.

5 comments about The Russian Revolution.

1. This is an excellent overview of the Russian Revolution. Pipes does an excellent job of distilling the different factions involved, and constructing the worldviews of those involved. The dichotomy between the outlook of the aristocracy and peasants was particularly good--much of the revolution's course was explained there.

   Throughout, I think Pipes did a good job of balancing the big picture with the details that are necessary to understand what was happening in such a large country at the time. His writing style varies somewhat throughout the different chapters, but on the whole was engaging and lively.

   I have only two (minor) complaints, hence 4 stars instead of 5. The first complaint is that the book ends around a chapter too soon. The civil war is left out almost entirely, and in general the book ended with many loose ends, without even a quick summary of what followed in history. This is not a problem for the scholar, but to a casual reader (like myself) it feels a bit abrupt.

   The second complaint, as others have noted, is Pipes' bias. When I got to Chapter 3 I started laughing out loud, and I wondered at first if it was written by someone else. Suddenly the objective writing style becomes full of venom for the "intelligentsia." Pipes' contempt is a constant theme throughout the remainder of the book, to the point where I wasn't sure how much I could trust some of his observations.

   This is still a great book. But I do wish Pipes had remained more objective--the atrocious record of the Bolshevik party's early years speaks for itself.




2. The Russian Revolution is a massive chronicle of detailed analysis, forming the middle volume to Pipes trilogy that began with Russia Under The Old Regime and concluded with Russia Under The Bolshevik Regime. This is a thoroughly absorbing work that shows from 1905 every tangled aspect leading up to the murder of the imperial family in July 1918 and start of the Red Terror.
   
   The swirling chaos brought about by the First World War and the Tsar's abdication, simultaneously created a situation of armed Russian troops that were waiting to be mobilised for the eastern front, now suddenly found themselves sitting on the edge of a power vacuum crater within Russia. Once the provisional government that stepped in to fill the void started to slide, many a contending, brutal faction rose to the boil with the odds definitely stacked against the Bolsheviks; a misleading term that means majority when in reality they were a violent minority.
   
   After the Bolshevik coup d' etat, it was the Germans who continued to prop them up, particularly after Lenin and Trotsky had signed away with the treaty of Brest-Litovsk huge amounts of Russian territory as far west as Kiev, enabling Russia to renege on its commitments to the allies who . . . `suffered immense human and material losses. As a result of Russia's dropping out of the war' . . . (only to internationalise the Revolution) . . . `the Germans withdrew from the inactive Eastern Front enough divisions to increase their effectives in the west by nearly one-fourth (from 150 to 192 divisions). These reinforcements allowed them to mount a ferocious offensive' . . . the allies . . . `lost hundreds of thousands of men. This sacrifice finally brought Germany to her knees. And the defeat of Germany, to which it had made no contribution . . . enabled the Soviet Government to annul the Brest-Litovsk Treaty and recover most of the lands which it had been forced to give up'. . . No other ruler in Russian history conceded so much territory as Lenin had. This, along with heavier taxes than under Tsarist times and multiplying murders against so called `counter-revolutionaries' made the Bolsheviks immediately unpopular.
   
   Here we have a constantly fascinating account teeming with every sort of personality and unpredictable event. We read about the fracturing succession of the Ukraine, Trans Caucasia (Georgia and Armenia) and (almost) Siberia into transient independent Republics with a startling sense of deja vu; it now seems the 1990's was a variation on a pre-existing theme. Whilst one of Pipes many themes, implicit in the titles Old Regime and Bolshevik Regime, claims that the all encompassing `patrimonial' system under Tsarist times precluded any sense of private property (everything physical and human belonged, within Russia, to the Tsar) and with the Bolshevik development of the one party state, `patrimonial' autocratic control continued; this has been keenly contradicted by several scholars but should not get in the way of an outstanding, breathtaking achievement by a single individual where so much has been given its proper perspective.
   
   Pipes also argues most convincingly that the `antecedents' to Stalinism had been mapped out by Lenin. The sorcerers apprentice intensified what had already begun. The last word belongs to Pipes and is indicative of this great work in helping us understand the incomprehensible . . . `Once society disintegrated into an agglomeration of human atoms, each fearful of being noticed and concerned exclusively with physical survival, then it ceased to matter what society thought, for the government had the entire sphere of public activity to itself. Only under these conditions could a small minority subjugate millions.'



3. This magesterial account corrects disinformational histories turned out by apologists for the Bolsheviks - for example:
   
   1). Lenin was not an unwavering proponent of his creed. At one time, around the turn of the last century, he advocated socialism by the electoral process (Russian opponents of the czars had seen the success of the German socialists in elections and largely abandoned their attempt to overthrow the regime by terror). He reverted, however, to the most extreme blood-lust of the People's Will - except that even these assassins had, as their goal, a Constituent Assembly. Lenin wanted a dictatorship.
   2). Lenin succeeded because of his organizational skills and his cunning in political infighting and - most of all - because the majority, democratic socialists had an obsessive fear of a counter-revolution by the monarchists. Time and gain, they hesitated when they could have crushed the Bolsheviks. Most of them could not see that a red czardom was in the offing and represented the true counterrevolution.
   3).The Revolution took place in February, 1917, and devolved into a rule-by-fiat under Kerensky. The event of October, 1917, was a COUP D'ETAT - a
   seizure of the key urban loci of communications, transportation and finance by a handful of armed men. The Bolsheviks at the time accounted for fewer than 30,000 - out of a nation of more than 100 million! Most were professional revolutionaries - self-styled intellectuals (although many, like Lenin, were not really educated in anything but politics). Perhaps they most resembled the campus Marxists of today's USA! Fewer than 10% of industrial workers or of the Russian military supported them and, when they did need military intervention, the Bolsheviks frequently had nobody but the Latvian Rifles (30,000-35,000 - not even Russians!)
   4). Allied landings in Archangel and Murmansk, beginning in 1918, were made not as an attempt to overthrow the Bolsheviks, but as a means of preventing German or Finnish seizure of these ports and the military stockpiles there. The landings were made upon invitation of the Soviets.
   (Later Communist charges were that this was "internal meddling" and anti-Bolshevik - but only Churchill and the German General Staff were truly far-sighted enough to advocate that!)
   5). Bolshevik efforts to stage similar coups in western Europe and to eliminate their domestic enemies by mass murder commenced in the earliest stages of their rule - with Lenin as the instigator.
   
   My only negative comments -
   1). the sometimes professorial writing style - outling things for the class ("there were two reasons for this...")
   2). a little too much antipathy for the Germans. Versailles was not less rapacious than Brest-Litovsk and certainly not "mild" - it stripped Germany of German-populated territories and imposed tremendous economic burdens. Brest-Litovsk created the same Russia that we have today, by divesting the Russian Empire of non-Russian nations (Baltic States, Poland, Finland, the Ukraine, Caucasus). (NB The author is a Polish Jew who barely escaped WWII Europe with his life, perhaps accounting for this antipathy and also his palpable sympathy for co-religionists Fanny Kaplan - attempted assassin of Lenin - and even Trotsky - to whom he gives credit for the coup).
   3). A minor item, but Hermann Rauschning's account of his private conversations with Hitler is cited. This memoire was shown in the 1980's to be fictional.
   
   Overall, a great work and a boon, in translation, to Russians seeking the truth of their history.
   Readers wanting the complete panorama may obtain "Russian Under the Old Regime" and "Russia Under the Bolshevik Regime" by the same author -
   a hero of our times!



4. It is a shame that such historians as Richard Pipes do not have a more prominent place on America's college campuses. His detailed account of the Russian Revolution convincingly debunks the long-held view that the Russian Revolution was somehow an expression of popular sentiments. Instead, it was, as Pipes calls it, a coup d'etat, led by a small group of hard-core revolutionaries. He convincingly demonstrates how this Bolshevik coup was quickly carried out by taking Petrograd's major transportation and communication hubs. By this point, the Provisonal Government was largely irrelevant, and few shots were actually fired! Not at all a repeat of the storming of the Bastille (itself something of a myth). Pipes also goes into a detailed discussion of the Bolsheviks' policies of War Communism and rule-by-terror. In so doing, Pipes argues that these policies were deliberately orchestrated to subjugate the Russian people (as opposed to being necessary wartime measures, which is often used as an apology for these policies). There are two things that Pipes discusses that are particularly interesting: the degree to which the Imperial German govt. sought to cultivate relations with the Bolsheviks in an effort to take over Russia and close down the Eastern Front and Lenin's ongoing protestations that the "Bolsheviks" were a private entity within Russia and therefore did not at all represent "offical" govt. policy. The latter allowed the Russian govt. to get around norms of international law and attempt to export Bolshevism to other areas of Europe. This duplicity served as a model for later totalitarian regimes to follow (check out Nazi Germany and the Islamic Republic of Iran for evidence of this). On a final note, Pipes demonstrates how the horrors of Stalinism had definite roots in the formative years of Bolshevik Russia (i.e., the all-pervasive Cheka and the "forced requisitions" against the peaseants). I think that many people forget this fact and want to believe that Stalin was somehow an aberration within the Soviet system.



5. This is a great history written by a person whose opinions of the indisputable events of the Russian Revolution - events with authors - is my own. In my opinion, Pipes ought to be congratulated for stating what any normal person would conclude if he were unconcerned with flattering the pervasive left-sympathetic character of the comentariat. The fact is this event and its effects are rather plain for all to see: only those who delude themselves into believing an ideology rooted in violence, articulated in violence, established in reality through violence, and issuing in the most institutionally violent of regimes could possibly believe all this is to be ignored or forgiven because of the rationalizations and claims of peace and moral insight. Clearly, Marxism (and its related ideologies) is the disease for which it purports to be the cure. The other fact is, all this dissimulation must end, and Pipes' book is a signal contribution to that goal. No ideology has been so thoroughly tested in so wide a variety of societies and resulted so uniformly in physical slaughter and immiseration and cultural deformity. Any of its current adherents are either intellectual buffoons or moral scum. This book illustrates the apotheosis of the ideology, and is not going to be surpassed.
   
   By the way, as one reviewer noted below, I think, one of this book's most interesting contributions is its revelations concerning the extent to which Germany propped up an paid for the Bolsheviks, especially Lenin, throughout the critical period of 1917. It's no wonder contemporary enemies considered Lenin a "mere German agent," a charge I'd thought paranoid until now.

5 comments about History of the Russian Revolution.

1. Whatever Trotsky's faults or your own political persuasion, his own history of the Russian Revolution is an excellently written, engaging and energetic work. Openly biased and without apology, Trotsky recounts the events before, during and after the Bolsheviks rise. Essential to understanding the motivations and mindset of one of history's greatest revolutionaries.



2. This book provides a very unique perspective into the Russian Revolution. Written by Leon Trotsky himself, it is an excellent way to get first hand information on the events of the revolution. Furthermore, it is very interesting to read how a leader of the revolution viewed the event after several years. Trotsky is an excellent writer, and his book is very detailed. My one warning is that if you don't know much about the Russian Revolution to begin with you may get somewhat confused because of the great amount of detail in this book.

   Trotsky's History of the Russian Revolution is written in the third person - just as a historian would write it - not in a first person narrative. After reading the book for a while, I sometimes even forget that it was written by Trotsky. Then, when some bizarre interpretation appears, I think - "What is this? Who wrote this book?" only to realize that, obviously, the book is written by Trotsky and would naturally be biased!

   Even if you don't read the entire book, just reading some of the passages can give you a very facinating perspective into the revolution. After all, Trotsky was one of the most important leaders during the revolution. It is not often that a revolutionary leader has time to record the events he lived through. Luckily for us, Trotsky did write an account of the Russian Revolution, an event that has clearly had immense influence on world history! So, I would totally recommend this book - read it, and see what Trotsky himself has to say!




3. This is a huge and wonderful book-- three volumes in one book, some 1200 pages in all. The story Trotsky lays out is most inspiring and encouraging: how revolutionary-minded workers and peasants in Russia, led by the Bolshevik party, overthrew the centuries-old Czarist monarchy, defeated the attempts to impose a capitalist dictatorship and went on to establish a worker and peasant revolutionary government, opening the road to the possibility of building a socialist society. It's a book you can read repeatedly, getting more out of it each time.

   Trotsky explains with rich detail the growing social crisis that wracked Russia, the devastating impact of World War I, the economic collapse, and the incapacity of the old regime to offer any way out. He takes up political developments amongst workers and peasants and the oppressed nationalities of the Russian Empire, including the many millions forced into the Russian army. You understand their growing conviction that the old society had to be and could be overturned and a new order established. And Trotsky gives real insight into the leadership that made possible an actual revolution under these conditions-- the development of the Bolshevik party led by V.I. Lenin and it's successful fight to win the allegiance of the struggling millions.

   Trotsky was, along with Lenin, a central leader of the 1917 revolution and of the government it established. After Lenin's death in 1924, he led the international fight to defend the Bolshevik's revolutionary course against the conservative and reactionary bureaucracy headed by Joseph Stalin that came to power later in the Soviet Union. This work was a key part of Trotsky's efforts to make the real facts and lessons 1917 available to future generations of workers, farmers and radicalizing young people. Read it along with some of his many other important works, including The Transitional Program for Socialist Revolution, In Defense of Marxism, The Revolution Betrayed, and The Struggle Against Fascism in Germany.




4. This is one of the most exciting books I've ever read. It tells the amazing story of the Russian revolution of 1917, from the overthrow of the Czar to the Bolshevik Revolution of October. What makes it an incredible read is that the author, Leon Trotsky, was at the middle of it all, as one of the central planners of the insurrection that took power. Trotsky was a great revolutionary and great writer. But one thing I especially like about the book is that Trotsky uses excerpts from many other accounts, including those who hated him with a passion, to tell the story accurately. It is an inspiring story, especially for new generations of young people, workers and farmers who need to learn about an example showing that the dog-eat-dog system of capitalism we live in can be overthrown. For the definitive account of how this great revolution was later derailed, see Trotsky's Revolution Betrayed.



5. In spite of its length, I've read this book several times. It isn't just a widely acclaimed historic and literary masterpiece, written by a leading participant in the events he describes. It isn't just vividly written and thoroughly researched.
   
   More importantly, it's one of the best books ever written about revolution, as relevant today as ever.
   
   The most important conclusion that emerges is the crucial role of a revolutionary party with an overwhelmingly working class membership, leadership and political orientation: a party that has trained itself in the many years of partial struggles that precede a revolutionary crisis; studied together the lessons of past revolutionary struggles throughout the world; and done everything possible to educate broader layers of workers in those lessons.
   
   (The point is illustrated both positively and negatively. More than once, Lenin had to turn to the Bolshevik's working class rank and file against wavering intellectuals in the party leadership.)
   
   Please don't be put off by the first chapter, the driest and most difficult in the book. The basic idea is that capitalism arrived late in Russia, imported from abroad in the form of huge factories, which laid the basis for the rapid development of a strong, militant labor movement. As a result, the emerging capitalist class was reluctant to mobilize the masses against the feudal nobles and landlords that stood in their way, for fear that the aroused workers might turn on the capitalists themselves.
   
   Under the impact of war and economic crisis, the resulting mixture of different forms of class oppression exploded in a combined revolt of workers, farmers, and oppressed nationalities, destroying both feudalism and capitalism by the time it was through.
   
   Several postcripts:
   
   (1) If you're wondering what went wrong in the Soviet Union after such a promising start, I recommend "The Revolution Betrayed" by Trotsky; also "Lenin's Final Fight" by Lenin.
   
   (2) I disagree with Trotsky's assessment of the pre-1917 differences between himself and Lenin concerning the role of working farmers, the relationship between democratic (anti-feudal) revolution and socialist revolution, and Lenin's formula, "the democratic dictatorship of the proletariat and the peasantry". I think Trotsky's discussion of this is confusing. I recommend "Their Trotsky and Ours" by Jack Barnes. There is also a good debate in "Bolshevism and the Russian Revolution" by Doug Jenness, Ernest Mandel, and V.I. Lenin.
   
   (3) Another reviewer pointed out that this book is available online. However, the printed version has glossaries of people, places, organizations and unfamiliar terms; a more complete chronology; and a thorough index. I relied very heavily on all of these, so much so that I used color-coded post-its to turn to them easily. Also, parts of the online version are full of obvious typos; books from Pathfinder Press are proofread very thoroughly.
   
   (4) Finally, I recommend the ads in the back of the book. Pathfinder Press is defined by a political goal, not commercial success. It aims to provide a platform for revolutionary leaders speaking in their own words. If you like one book, you will probably like others.

5 comments about The Russian Revolution.

1. Fitzpatrick's short book about the Russian Revolution is so concise one has to wonder if she skimped on the facts. This is not the case. Anybody reading the book can only remark that thickness is not indicative of weight. All one needs to know about the Russian Revolution is in this slim volume.
   Fitzpatrick's main contention is that the Russian Revolution did not end in 1920, but rather in the 1930s when Stalin consolidated his power and put in place a new system which suceeded the Tsarist regime. Stalin did this by educating a new elite from the working class and placing them in the Party and Government. Future leaders came from this group. The two five year plans stabilized the revolution and placed a new order on the country.
   I also found the characterization of Lenin good. Lenin put in place a situation which led to the rise of the dictatorship of Joseph Stalin. Lenin is seen as both good and bad.
   There are more meaty books about the Russian Revolution. There is not one which is more concise and explains all the facts.



2. This book receives lots of kudos from other reviewers for being so concise. That it is, but I didn't experience that attribute as being as positive as the others. If the topic of the Russian Revolution is assigned reading for you and you want to get it out of the way as quickly as possible, get this book. On the other hand, if the topic fascinates you and you're looking to explore it, I expect you may find this book unsatisfying. Consider skipping this "appetizer" and going right for the main course somewhere else (not sure where that is yet, but I'll be looking for it).



3. Book is good, touches on many subects, including ideology, revolutionary theory and practice, collectivization, industrialization, Stalin, Lenin, Trotsky and a brief introduction to how the three interacted as historical figures. Short book wetts your appitite to learn more about subject. If you were like me when I read it, I didn't have much background on the 1905-1932 period of Russian history covered in this book. Thus I enoyed it. Lastly, I found it authoritative--yet fair (and "balanced"). I am on the left and am critical of even those who profess to be on my side, so I am cautious about what and how I read. Nontheless, I approve of this book for not siding with the elite bourgeois bias of the common university "professor of truth." I would give 4.5 stars and not five because Mrs. Fitzpatrick should have enough knowledge in her head to have written more than 100something pages.



4. There are numerous books out debunking Fitzpatrick. Yale University's "Annals of Communism" series is a good place to start.
   
   "In Denial: Historians, Communism & Espionage" by John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr is an excellent read on how Fitzpatrick and other academics distort facts and lie through omission to minimize the atrocities of Lenin, Zinoviev, Radek, Trotsky, Stalin et al.
   
   Read "A Century of Violence in Soviet Russia"
   by Alexander N. Yakovlev. Yakovlev was the architect of perestroika. He was a communist. He had access to documents western researchers have not yet seen. Yakovlev details how the regime was a criminal organization from its founding, how mass executions began only months after Lenin seized power. The regime never had the support Fitzpatrick claims it did.
   



5. I am enjoying this book immensely. I was looking for a good intermediate source to transition me from a Wiki-level knowledge of the RR (which I already had) to the point where I felt capable of tackling a professional academic tome on the RR (which I would like to someday do). Fitzpatrick's book fits this bill nicely. Each chapter covers a certain time period and starts out with a short intro (just a few pages) that mentions the major controversies among historians about how to view the events of this period. The author occasionally takes a side in these debates, but usually just presents them so that the reader is aware of their existence. Then she launches into the chapter, which pretty much just consists of a summary of events. The book is dense with facts but is also a very quick and easy read. In other words, the perfect thing for someone who is interested in this topic but not used to reading huge academic history books, or for someone who just wants the facts without any thesis that the author is trying to prove.

3 comments about The Curse of the Romanovs.

1. THE CURSE OF THE ROMANOVS by Staton Rabin is an absolutely spell-binding story of Alexei Romanov and the Russian Revolution.
   
   The story begins in Russia in 1916, where Alexei Romanov is the hemophiliac heir to the Russian throne. As a hemophiliac, Alexei cannot stop bleeding, and the only person who can seem to heal him is Father Grigory, otherwise known as Rasputin. So many of the Russian people despise Father Grigory and spread gossip about his drinking and womanizing, but Alexei's mother, the Tsarina, comforts Alexei by telling him that these are all lies and that Father Grigory is their dear friend.
   
   Alexei believes his mother, until one night when he hears a conversation between his mother and Father Grigory that challenges everything he has been told. Not knowing where to turn, Alexei confides in his cousin, who decides to murder Father Grigory. But killing Father Grigory is not as easy as it appears, and when Alexei fears for his own life, he flees to the year 2010, using a method that Father Grigory himself taught Alexei.
   
   In the future, Alexei meets a distant relative, Varda Rosenberg, who is currently working on a cure for hemophilia. When Alexei learns about the Russian Revolution and the fate of his family, he is determined to travel back to the past and rescue them from a horrible death at the hands of the Bolsheviks. With Varda's help, Alexei travels back into the past in a desperate attempt to save his family, his honor, and his way of life. But will he be able to change the course of history?
   
   Staton Rabin somehow mixes the genres of science fiction and historical fiction to create a novel unlike any I have ever read. So much of the story is fact-based that you will find yourself believing every word. Rabin captures the voice of a young Alexei so well, as the book is written in diary form. At the end of the novel, author's notes clear up any misconceptions and separate fact from fiction.
   
   So many stories have been written about the Romanov family, including the Disney movie Anastasia (Family Fun Edition w/Bartok the Magnificent). But Rabin's take on this famous story is so different than all of the others, it is definitely worth reading!
   
   Reviewed by: Amber Gibson



2. This book is a work of art! It combines science fiction, non-fiction and fiction to create a wonderful tale, another perspective of the Romanovs! This book is not just for teens!



3. As the Romanov family is one of favorite subjects in history I picked up this book. While it was a great story (historical fiction account), I didn't like that the author towards the end of the book portrayed Rasputin in a good light. However, the author did a great job and should be commended on all her hard work researching the family and everything surrounding them during their time.

5 comments about A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution: 1891-1924.

1. The book is clean, but the condition is not as good as described.



2. Figes is a historian of the very highest calibre, and this book is nothing short of breath-taking -- in its scope, in its fluency, in its mastery, in its impact.
   
   As the title makes clear, this is a tragic story, told with force and coherence, on the ascendancy of Communism in Russia. Leninism was not an inevitable consequence of conditions in Russia at the start of the 20th century. Rather, as Figes argues, it was an outgrowth of circumstance, of cowardice, of miscalculation and missed opportunities. Into this breach stepped Vladimir Lenin and the Bolsheviks.
   
   The book, ultimately, stands as the most fitting possible epitaph for the unmourned death of the Soviet Union.



3. Wonderful. If there's a man who can write non-fiction books Orlando Figes is one. I wish he would write about other times and places, I would buy his books immediately. His other book on Russia's culture (I forgot the title) is also great. The best thing about this author is that anything he writes about, no matter how complicated it may seem or how foreign it may be, he makes it vivid and absorbing. Reading him is like having your best friend trying to make you understand something you've been studying but still can't get the gist of.
   
   I like the way he presents us with the facts. It's not deferential to any political side. He talks about the people, not about ideas or policies. He lets us know how people lived, their environment, their heritage and personal backgrounds, how they felt and what they believed in, what they lacked and what they wanted. It's all about people. You see what they did, you know their circumstances, then you judge. I love that.
   
   I did notice, though, that the author tends to explain (or should I say blame?) failure many times on lack of a consensus between factions, which seems to me a childish excuse, an easy scapegoat. Then, when he presents other versions of the facts, and compares them to his, he always makes sure his version stands middle-of-the-way between the "rightist" and the "leftist". But I doubt if there really exists any "rightist" version at all in some cases. Anyway, this book was a pleasure to read.



4. I read this good book, here in Brazil.This long book is about russian people history.Since 1891, until the Lenin's death by syphillis in 1924.
   Massive famine, World War I,torture, civil war, genocides and canibalism are in full coverage in this good book.
   The main defect of this book is to be so long.
   Some photos on this book; all of them are black & white.



5. There are several problems with this overall well-executed tome that have been pointed out by others, but what I particularly took exception to was the evident eagerness to excuse bloodlust by the mob by reducing it to "violence." Professor Figes seems to believe that if a mob involved in social unrest commits an atrocity, then it can't really be an atrocity, especially if that social unrest blossoms into a full-blown revolution. This lack of a moral compass in favor of Power to the People is downright bizarre. Even a righteously angry mob is composed of men and women who possess the power of self-control, and whatever their justification for revolting, they are morally responsible for the deeds they commit when they let go of that self control. "Freedom" and "liberty" are no excuse for murder, rapine and torture, and the professor is very wrong to snidely cite Schama and Pipes as examples of modern writers with a "prejudice against violence" because they evidently couldn't turn a blind eye toward a revolutionary crowd running amuck.
   
   And as a post script--unlike some reviewers, I welcomed most of the anecdotal material as a window onto the day-to-day struggles of the selected individuals chosen for the book. Figes' literary style is engaging and appealing, no small task in so daunting a subject. This history reads as well as his captivating social history, Natasha's Dance.

5 comments about Doctor Zhivago.

1. Doctor Zhivago is a personal epic treatise on the Russian Revolution and how it affected Russians through the eyes, particularly, of one poet. Banned at one point by the Russian government, the book gives a very good description of what it was like for the peasant and aristocrat during the time of the Bolshevik revolution. Pasternack opens a window to a time of violent change, of challenges to personal liberty and expression under the devastating communist wave. Written in another age, present day readers may find it cumbersome and hard to keep track of some characters (referred to with all four names, usually). It is, however, one of the best and most rich representations of a milestone in the history of the Soviet Union and ultimately a love story of epic scope.



2. I've always considered myself a good reader. I mean, my favorite novel is by Victor Hugo, so it's not like I'm incapable of following wordy descriptions of city landmarks or numerous characters who are loosely connected. But Dr. Zhivago is the first novel where I've ever had to consult Spark Notes just to get a clue of what was going on.
   
   That said, I plodded through it and finally finished it, only for a terrible, anti-climactic ending. The problem, I believe, is with Lara. The author clearly wants us to root for Zhivago and Lara, but he does nothing to make the reader want to root for them. I hated Lara, I found Zhivago's love of her unbelievable; it was obvious as a plot device. They were made for each other because the author says so. Meanwhile, I loved Tonia, and didn't know why Zhivago just completely forgot about her after she went to Paris. I also don't know exactly why we're supposed to swoon over a pairing that basically hurts the lives of everyone involved and makes Zhivago abandon all of his responsibilities as a husband and father. If I liked the character until then, I assure you that my liking ceased when he was more concerned with pining over Lara than the welfare of his wife and children.
   
   As for its historical significance, it was good in that regard, but I think that We The Living by Ayn Rand (though obviously not regarded as a classic) presents a better picture of Soviet life. It has a better love story, too.



3. Like others have said, this book does a great job at depicting what Russia was like during the revolution. Otherwise, the story is really hard to get into. It's historically important, but not an enjoyable read.



4. My first reading of Dr. Zhivago was in high school. At 15, the book was a chore. Impenetrable and numerous Russian names (often for the same character) and endless description of the Russian landscape left me exhausted and unimpressed. After rereading and enjoying a few other high school assignments, I came across Dr. Zhivago on my bookshelf and wondered if I would find more appreciation for Mr. Pasternak's novel ten years later.
   
   Yes, I did. And no, I didn't.
   
   I found that this time around I had something more of a connection with the characters. I better understood the way that life can pull a person in strange directions and drop them into unexpected and unwanted situations. I understood that sometimes people are swept into and out of the place they want to be - and why they stay where things are bad and leave where things are good. I certainly had a far greater appreciation for Pasternak's obviously loving descriptions of his homeland.
   
   That said, the things that drove my dislike of Dr. Zhivago the first time were still still there. The sprawling story and unending task of keeping all the characters straight were still a detraction. I don't know if the problem with character names springs from the fact that, being Russian names, they are unfamiliar to my mind or if Pasternak simply failed to rein in his cast of thousands. Unresolved plot lines rarely bother me but, when combined with extensive background on what ending up being minor characters, Dr. Zhivago felt a bit as if Pasternak let the narrative get away from him. Maybe that was the point. Sometimes life just gets away from you. After all, he's the one with a Nobel Prize. Who am I to criticize?
   
   While I actually liked the novel this time, I feel as if I should have liked Dr. Zhivago more than I did. Maybe it's that I can't escape my first impression.



5. "Doctor Zhivago" by Boris Pasternak, © 1957, 1958, 1958
   
   Quite the love story. It is sad, and a lot is made of the Russian Revolution, as is right. The times were in turmoil and it affected everyone. It is to be noted that the same events are happening in Iraq today: factions fighting factions; injustice and terrorism are treated as if just and right because the perpetrators are a part of some group that thinks so; etc.
   This is really a soap opera. People live their lives and have troubles, solve problems, create heartache and what not, just like we do in real life. The story does not deal in psychology, so a few times the choices of the characters are truly left to your own intuition and understanding of human nature. Some of the philosophy spouted by these people gets a bit esoteric and convoluted, by and large, it is understandable, just a bit odd to read in a literary story.
   As I read the book, I began to feel as if, if I tried, I could see Lara as a microcosm for Russian peasants. They were violated young, treated all right for a time, left to their own resources, on and on, up through the Russian Revolution. Maybe that is the quality of this book that so many people were enthralled to read it. It could also have been the history told through personal toil that was what people of the West were really interested in. I am not a real fan of that sort of literature. I did not enjoy reading Galsworthy, "The Forsthye Saga" either. They are just too mundane
   It is interesting that this is a story of a philander. Yuri marries his childhood sweetheart, then finds another sweet and gentle soul to enjoy. The marriage falls apart due to social conditions and Yuri's inability to do anything for his family. At one point, he realizes he has not been much of a father to his children. It makes him sad, but there is little he can do to undo or make things better for any of them. I guess that, in the sense that a philander goes outside of his marriage to have sex for the heightened libido or something, Yuri is not like that. He truly loves his wife and Lara, seemingly equally as much. They both have the sun shining out of their root charka, as far as he is concerned. As for his last lover, there he is just trying to still be human, but his mental state is such that he fails at that and in the end abandons her.