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The History of the Russian Revolution
The First Five Years of the Communist International
The Teamster Rebellion: The 1930's Strikes and Organising Drive That Transformed the Labour Movement in the Mid-West (Teamster S.)
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Che Guevara Talks to Young People
Left Opposition in Us 1928-31 Pb
St. Helena, 1502-1938 (South Atlantic Library)
The Enchanted Islands: Galapagos Discovered
Bay of Pigs: Washington's First Military Defeat in the Americas
Tow Trucks: A Photographic History
Old Fort Snelling Instruction Book for Fife with Music of Early America (Minnesota Historic Sites Pamphlet Series)
Chippewa Customs (Borealis Book S.)
Dakota or Sioux in Minnesota as They Were in 1834 (Borealis Book S.)
With Pen and Pencil on the Frontier in 1851: Diary and Sketches of Frank Blackwell Mayer (Borealis Book S.)
High Water
They Chose Minnesota: A Survey of the State's Ethnic Groups
Snowshoe Country (Borealis Book S.)
The Checkered Years: A Bonanza Farm Diary 1884-88
Minnesota in a Century of Change: The State and Its People Since 1900
Genealogical Resources of the Minnesota Historical Society: A Guide
One Woman's War: Letters Home From the Women's Army Corps, 1944-1946
Watchdog of Loyalty: The Minnesota Commission of Public Safety During World War I
To Be an Indian (Borealis Book S.)
Greek Mesolithic: Problems and Perspectives, The
The Ojibwa of Western Canada, 1780-1870 (Manitoba Studies in Native History)

History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)

Average customer rating:

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed.
Very Interesting
History as Science Fiction
Provocative, appealing and controversial
pharaohs lived in the 3rd century AD

History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
Anatoly Fomenko
Manufacturer: Mithec
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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History: Fiction or Science? Chronology 2 (Chronology)
Discovering the Mysteries of Ancient America: Lost History And Legends, Unearthed And Explored
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ASIN: 2913621058

Book Description

Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.

Customer Reviews:

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09

There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.

For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.

Very Interesting.......2007-03-07

It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.

History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10

Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.

I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.

Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.

Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.

I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.

This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.

Provocative, appealing and controversial.......2006-08-02

Fomenko has succeeded to convincingly demonstrate the misconception about what "history" factually is... It is fiction and -like we can read and judge for ourselves- no science. It indeed is "make belief" only. I "discovered" Fomenko while studying the "old" history of Al Andaluz, Spain. Having found too many contradictions in available data, having seen too many forgeries as to pretend the importance of christianity for its decline, I ventured out to find Fomenko, who convinced me that we know little if anything for sure of the epoch before the XI-century. However, the integration of the Arabic-Islamic cultural history into the heavily distorted Western fails... There are some attempts to fit "the budding new religion" (Islam) into Fomenko's scheme, but they are too weak to be taken seriously and too often focussing on Turkey as the region where things started to influence the West, which is untrue at all.
Islam certainly was no "new religion" in the X-century. That the highly cultivated Al Andaluz ruler Mohammed-I could have been "mirrored" down in time into some myth about the "illiterate" founder of Islam itself is highly speculative. Nevertheless, Fomenko convinces me about the processes that were involved in forging a christian history. Intriguing and controversial as his books are, I recommend them as to rethink our current position in time and space and simply verify what was claimed. It is a "good" book, but not for bedtime reading... Mundus vult decipi, the world wants to be cheated. Fomenko's readers will understand why.

pharaohs lived in the 3rd century AD.......2006-02-16

Traces of white wine were found in Tutankhamen's tomb however there were no record of white wine in Egypt until the 3rd century AD, 1600 years after the young pharaoh died according to the traditional chronology. http://www.newscientist.com/channel/being-human/mg18925395.400
It can be interpreted as a contribution towards New Chronology theory that pharaohs lived in the 3rd century AD.

Average customer rating:

A couple comments
The flaws are much of what makes it so great.
Art is always meditating upon death and thereby creating life
Pasternak's Purpose
Zhivago Summary

Doctor Zhivago
Boris Pasternak
Manufacturer: Pantheon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0679774386
Release Date: 1997-03-18

Book Description

n celebration of the 40th anniversary of its original publication, here is the only paperback edition now available of the classic story of the life and loves of a poet/physician during the turmoil of the Russian Revolution.

Customer Reviews:

A couple comments.......2007-06-20

Rather than re-writing what many have already stated, I need to contest some reviews. Someone mentioned the conclusion was pointless and could have been done without. Some of the most beautiful lines of the book are contained in the last three chapters (14, 15, 16).

Just a light sampling of their beauty (all from the conclusion):

"You must never, never despair, whatever the circumstances. To hope and to act are our duties in misfortune. To do nothing and to despair is to neglect our duty."

"Never, never, not even in their moments of richest and wildest happiness, had they lost the sense of what is highest and most ravishing - joy in the whole universe, its form, its beauty, the feeling of their own belonging to it, being part of it."

"The riddle of life, the riddle of death, the beauty of genius, the beauty of loving - that, yes, that we understood. As for such petty trifles as re-shaping the world - these things, no thank you, they are not for us."

The character development may not be sewn up neatly, but the philosophical and theological ideas Pasternak expresses come to a climax in these final chapters. The fact that some similes, metaphors, etc. were not really working, as one reviewer stated, could easily be due to the translation. In the translator's note they recognize this is not the translation of a poet. The beauty of language is often lost in translation, and thus this is not really a fair criticism of the work.

I will agree that there are too many minor characters that are overly developed, and overly detailed descriptions at times. Part of me took that as influence from Tolstoy, and part of me expected it a bit given this is Russian literature and that tends to come with the territory. However, I agree that these were weak points of the novel.

Overall, however, the novel was well worth the read. While reading a novel written by a poet can be difficult at times, you can generally count on some truly beautiful descriptions and insights. Pasternak does not dissappoint in my opinion. The repeated juxtaposition of nature and the destruction of Russia sent chills down my spine.

The flaws are much of what makes it so great........2007-01-05

I read Zhivago for the first time in high school. I loved it, but didn't pick it up again for 20 years. I was surprised to find it rough going at the beginning. When I had first read the book, it had been precisely the first 100 or so pages that had enchanted me and pulled me into the novel. This time around, it was the complex and often frustrating last half of the book that really moved me. I guess this is a measure of how the book grows with the reader.

Doctor Zhivago is a complicated book that seems to me largely about how people get involved with circumstances (politics, love affairs) that do not interest them, simply because life leaves them vulnerable. That makes for a strange reading experience, because it is not a message that wraps itself up neatly. The texture of the novel is in part about ends-- loose ends, dead ends, character cul-de-sacs. A more experienced author wouldn't have tried to work this theme out in prose using the same methods that Pasternak employed. The book rolls from melodrama to nearly documentary realism. He uses diary form, letters, even poetry to complete the work. I guess it was his lack of experience that allowed him to (very nearly) achieve the impossible. The feeling of the book is an awful lot like life.

There are certainly more polished and perfect novels and novelists out there. Doctor Zhivago would not have profited from their example. As the title of this review says, Zhivago is great precisely because it isn't perfect. It is a great sprawling messy wonderful world of a book.

Recommended for readers of all ages.

Art is always meditating upon death and thereby creating life.......2006-12-18

Dr. Zhivago's ideal life `escape into freedom out of all sorrows' contrasts sharply with the horrors of war and revolution around him: `the ruthless logic of mutual extermination.' As a doctor he is daily confronted with `survivors whom the technique of modern fighting had turned into lumps of mutilated flesh.' Red and White atrocities rivaled each other in savagery.
After the Reds won the civil war, `the old oppression of the tsarist state was replaced by a much harsher yoke of the revolutionary superstate led by the professionals, the Bolsheviks, and their false sympathizers, informers, intrigues and hatred.'
Their Marxist policies are severely criticized: `Marxism is not sufficiently master of itself. Ordinary people are anxious to test their theories in practice, to learn from experience, but those who wield power are so anxious to establish the myth of their own infallibility that they turn their back on truth.'

Dr. Zhivago with his independent mind and love for humanity highly understands that nothing can be gained from violence: childhood friends fight each other in the name of their truth, `man is a wolf to man'; `stranger meeting stranger killed for fear of being killed.'
Under the totalitarian system, he feels bitterly `the loss of faith in the value of personal opinion. Instead of being natural and spontaneous, something artificial, forced, crept into our conversation; falsehood had crept into our lives.'

Boris Pasternak's book is a profound meditation on life and death, love and hate, personal commitment and mass ideology, freedom and slavery, war and peace.
The fate of the main characters and the crossings of their lives within the upheavals provoked by war, revolution and totalitarianism are masterfully painted and heart-rending.
This magically written and brilliantly built novel is an eternal masterpiece. It stands in sharp contrast with the extreme vulgarity of the anti-Pasternak campaign in the USSR after Pasternak was awarded the Nobel prize (see I. Kadaré's `Le Crépuscule des Dieux de la Steppe').
A must read.

Pasternak's Purpose.......2006-11-12

Boris Pasternak's, Doctor Zhivago, is not supposed to be a political or philosophical novel though it has both those components in it. It is not just a romance or a historical look at the Russian Revolution- though it has those things as well. Above all else, Doctor Zhivago is a statement on life. It outlines the journeys of intertwining lives through an amazing time period. In an entry from Zhivago's diary he explains that this telling of a human story is the essence of all art. Pasternak hints to readers that this is, in fact the inspiration of his work, "You can call it an idea, a statement about life, so all-embracing that it cant be split up into separate worlds; and if there is so much as a particle of it in any work that includes other things as well, it outweighs all the other ingredients in significance and turns out to be the essence, the heart and soul of the work." (282). Pasternak shows readers through characters, themes, plot, and setting the intimate details of people's lives. He follows them from early life to death and from maturing philosophical ideals to basic getting by. This is the spirit of his work, his masterpiece, a beautifully written account of the fictional Yuri Zhivago's time on earth.

Work Cited
Pasternak, Boris. Doctor Zhivago. New York: Pantheon Books Inc, 1958.

Zhivago Summary.......2006-11-11

Doctor Zhivago, written by Boris Pasternak, is a story about the turmoil of revolutionary Russia and its people. It begins a few years before the Bolshevik Revolution and follows events that lead to Civil War and the establishment of the Soviet government. The main character is Dr. Zhivago, a kind and passionate man, who is constantly affected by these events.
The book has excellent historical value as well as detail of its characters so that it fully embodies the disorderly mindset of the people. This is most evident in Dr. Zhivago's relationship with a woman named Lara. He and his wife Tonya were happily married but when he was drafted to a medical outpost he fell in love with the nurse Lara. Though the Doctor is a good man he is torn between his two loves and inevitably cheats on Tonya. His relationship with Lara beautifully parallels the political struggle that was taking place in Russia. She represents the Communist Russia that the people longed for. She is so close yet unattainable; every time the doctor begins to settle with her they experience pain and hardship, whether it be by outside forces or their own actions. She is impossible to reach, impossible to forget, and their relationship, like the revolution, was impossible stop once it began. Dr. Zhivago allows the reader to witness a struggle of the human mind's judgment and its desires. It demonstrates that our decisions can start us in one direction and that life's unforeseeable circumstances can easily lead us astray.

A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution: 1891-1924

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Absorbing and comprehensive
Exceptional, comprehensive and erudite
Book condition is not as good as described
A Brilliant and Unforgettable History
review of A People's Tragedy

A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution: 1891-1924
Professor Orlando Figes
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
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ASIN: 014024364X

Amazon.com

Written in a narrative style that captures both the scope and detail of the Russian revolution, Orlando Figes's history is certain to become one of the most important contemporary studies of Russia as it was at the beginning of the 20th century. With an almost cinematic eye, Figes captures the broad movements of war and revolution, never losing sight of the individuals whose lives make up his subject. He makes use of personal papers and personal histories to illustrate the effects the revolution wrought on a human scale, while providing a convincing and detailed understanding of the role of workers, peasants, and soldiers in the revolution. He moves deftly from topics such as the grand social forces and mass movements that made up the revolution to profiles of key personalities and representative characters.

Figes's themes of the Russian revolution as a tragedy for the Russian people as a whole and for the millions of individuals who lost their lives to the brutal forces it unleashed make sense of events for a new generation of students of Russian history. Sympathy for the charismatic leaders and ideological theorizing regarding Hegelian dialectics and Marxist economics--two hallmarks of much earlier writing on the Russian revolution--are banished from these clear-eyed, fair-minded pages of A People's Tragedy. The author's sympathy is squarely with the Russian people. That commitment, together with the benefit of historical hindsight, provides a standpoint Figes take full advantage of in this masterful history.

Book Description

It is history on an epic yet human scale. Vast in scope, exhaustive in original research, written with passion, narrative skill, and human sympathy, A People's Tragedy is a profound account of the Russian Revolution for a new generation. Many consider the Russian Revolution to be the most significant event of the twentieth century. Distinguished scholar Orlando Figes presents a panorama of Russian society on the eve of that revolution, and then narrates the story of how these social forces were violently erased. Within the broad stokes of war and revolution are miniature histories of individuals, in which Figes follows the main players' fortunes as they saw their hopes die and their world crash into ruins. Unlike previous accounts that trace the origins of the revolution to overreaching political forces and ideals, Figes argues that the failure of democracy in 1917 was deeply rooted in Russian culture and social history and that what had started as a people's revolution contained the seeds of its degeneration into violence and dictatorship. A People's Tragedy is a masterful and original synthesis by a mature scholar, presented in a compelling and accessibly human narrative.

Customer Reviews:

Absorbing and comprehensive.......2007-05-05

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.

Exceptional, comprehensive and erudite.......2007-04-12

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.

Book condition is not as good as described.......2007-01-08

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

A Brilliant and Unforgettable History.......2006-09-26

Rarely, one stumbles across a book that is of such surpassing excellence, and whose scholarship is worn so lightly, that you know, reading it, that you will never be able to forget it, and what you learn from it. Figes' A People's Tragedy is this rarity. I have read many books about the Russian Revolution, but no book has the sweep, the clarity, the balance, and the heartbreak of this. I literally had to put it down every so often because the sheer tragedy of what I was reading was more than I could bear.

First, Figes briskly deals with all those things you thought you knew about the Russian Revolution, Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, Kerensky - the liberals, the Bolsheviks, the Tsar. Again and again, I realized I had picked up myths either promoted by those who lost, or those who consolidated, the Revolution. The mythmaking machine was going full tilt from 1917 onwards (particularly during the Stalinist and Cold War Years) and this book would be irreplaceable if only for stripping away so much that you thought you knew - which was wrong.

Second, by starting the book in 1891 (with a famine which revealed the incompetence of the Tsarist beaurocracy) and ending with the death of Lenin in 1924, Figes permits himself a sweep of events that makes what actually happened even more dramatic than it was. Again and again, you not only read about, but hear from the survivors of, mistakes, errors, misconceptions - indolence, arrogance, foolishness, well-meaning idiocy - in a way that, as a human being, is more than heartbreaking. Again and again, the Revolution might never have happened, a democracy might have developed, steps taken could have been taken back - but they weren't. Instead, one of the great mass tragedies of history occurred, and you feel like a helpless bystander, watching it happen.

This is remarkable history and it is an extraordinary achievement. It is bound to upset those with fixed ideologies on both the left and the right. If you ever read only one book on the Russian Revolution, make it this one.

review of A People's Tragedy.......2006-07-22

I have read many books on the Russian Revolution, and this one is among the best. He presents many vivid anecdotes which give one the sense of the confusion and violence, but also the euphoria and promise, of Russia during the revolutionary period. He clearly sides against the Bolsheviks (though he is fair enough to present some valid reasons why they imposed some of their policies, and carefully distinguishes the different strands of this variant of Marxism), and seems to favour Prince Lvov's liberalism and Maxim Gorky's leftist humanism, but I myself have no problem with this: of all the perspectives of the Russian revolutionary period, the latter seem to be the most humane, even if they were ultimately doomed.

Average customer rating:

One of the best books ever written about revolution
How to overthrow the profit system
Powerful account of a great revolution!
Facinating!
Essential reading for the Russian Revolution

History of the Russian Revolution
Leon Trotsky
Manufacturer: Pathfinder Press (NY)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0873488296

Customer Reviews:

One of the best books ever written about revolution.......2005-04-18

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.

How to overthrow the profit system.......2003-05-08

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.

Powerful account of a great revolution!.......2003-04-27

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.

Facinating!.......2002-07-14

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!

Essential reading for the Russian Revolution.......2002-05-03

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.

The Furies: Violence and Terror in the French and Russian Revolutions.

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Evolution, revolution or involution ?
The thesis is strong, but the argument is weak
Fascinating study of counter-revolutionary violence

The Furies: Violence and Terror in the French and Russian Revolutions.
Arno J. Mayer
Manufacturer: Princeton University Press
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ASIN: 0691090157

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The growing frequency of peaceful expansions of human rights, private property, and market capitalism lead many to consider violent revolutions a thing of the past. In light of, for example, the dismantling of the Soviet Empire, the reunification of Germany, and the Czechoslovakian "velvet Revolution," violence as a mechanism for institutional change seems immoral and counterproductive, an anachronism in our age of global economies and shuttle diplomacy. Arno Mayer takes a contrarian position in The Furies: Violence and Terror in the French and Russian Revolutions. Throughout his comparative study, he maintains that "there is no revolution without violence and terror." Contrary to popular belief, Mayer argues, ideologies and personalities did not control events. Rather, the tide of violence overwhelmed the political actors who assumed power, and even the best-laid plans could not stem the chaos.

Mayer structures his study around what he considers integral components of revolution: civil and foreign war, iconoclasm and religious conflict, and collision between city and country. The Furies begins with a theoretical examination of revolution in general, counterrevolution, violence, terror, vengeance, and religion. Its second portion offers a close comparison of the revolutions in 1789 France and 1917 Russia, following each from their outbreak to the foreign and civil wars that ensued. Professor of History Emeritus at Princeton University, Mayer belongs to the major league of heavy-hitting academic historians, and to a large degree, The Furies is written for his colleagues. Footnote heavy, it assumes a studied familiarity with both revolutions, and Mayer's abundant theoretical references quickly frustrate the lesser informed. However, in maintaining the integrality of violence in revolution, Mayer challenges many unexamined assumptions about the two most influential revolutions of modern times, and he forces reexamination of the nature of violence in the revolutionary process. --Bertina Loeffler Sedlack

Book Description

Although these two upheavals arose in different environments, they followed similar courses. The thought and language of Enlightenment France were the glories of western civilization; those of tsarist Russia's intelligentsia were on its margins. Both revolutions began as revolts vowed to fight unreason, injustice, and inequality; both swept away old regimes and defied established religions in societies that were 85% peasant and illiterate; both entailed the terrifying return of repressed vengeance. Contrary to prevalent belief, Mayer argues, ideologies and personalities did not control events. Rather, the tide of violence overwhelmed the political actors who assumed power and were rudderless. Even the best plans could not stem the chaos that at once benefited and swallowed them. Mayer argues that we have ignored an essential part of all revolutions: the resistances to revolution, both domestic and foreign, which help fuel the spiral of terror.

In his sweeping yet close comparison of the world's two transnational revolutions, Mayer follows their unfolding--from the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Bolshevik Declaration of the Rights of the Toiling and Exploited Masses; the escalation of the initial violence into the reign of terror of 1793-95 and of 1918-21; the dismemberment of the hegemonic churches and religion of both societies; the "externalization" of the terror through the Napoleonic wars; and its "internalization" in Soviet Russia in the form of Stalin's "Terror in One Country." Making critical use of theory, old and new, Mayer breaks through unexamined assumptions and prevailing debates about the attributes of these particular revolutions to raise broader and more disturbing questions about the nature of revolutionary violence attending new foundations.

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The great romance and fear of bloody revolution--strange blend of idealism and terror--have been superseded by blind faith in the bloodless expansion of human rights and global capitalism. Flying in the face of history, violence is dismissed as rare, immoral, and counterproductive. Arguing against this pervasive wishful thinking, the distinguished historian Arno J. Mayer revisits the two most tumultuous and influential revolutions of modern times: the French Revolution of 1789 and the Russian Revolution of 1917.Although these two upheavals arose in different environments, they followed similar courses. The thought and language of Enlightenment France were the glories of western civilization; those of tsarist Russia's intelligentsia were on its margins. Both revolutions began as revolts vowed to fight unreason, injustice, and inequality; both swept away old regimes and defied established religions in societies that were 85% peasant and illiterate; both entailed the terrifying return of repressed vengeance. Contrary to prevalent belief, Mayer argues, ideologies and personalities did not control events. Rather, the tide of violence overwhelmed the political actors who assumed power and were rudderless. Even the best plans could not stem the chaos that at once benefited and swallowed them. Mayer argues that we have ignored an essential part of all revolutions: the resistances to revolution, both domestic and foreign, which help fuel the spiral of terror.

Customer Reviews:

Evolution, revolution or involution ?.......2007-02-19

"The revolutions - like Saturn - devour its own sons"

The violence and terror in the French and Russian revolutions are separated by a period of almost a century and a third. But the French revolution carved in relief and some how the conscious of the collective in the political decision take, as well as the introduction for the first time in the history of three concepts that sounded much more metaphorically that realistically, liberty, equality and fraternity.

The author examines zealously many conceptual signposts such as revolution, vengeance, violence and terror, from a enriched perspective where he makes a lucid revision of the implicit facts derived from these poetic ideas, that not only shocked the world but the way it was molded by this fact.

It's useless to affirm the echoes of the French revolution to the light of just two hundred years and two decades, is less than nothing in the history. The inherited paradigms, the wrong beliefs and distorted concepts have generated between other the nationalism fever that altered radically the sociopolitical geography of four continents, besides altered the cultural development all over Europe and seeded new horizons into Philosophy, art and religion; also it accelerated the process of other political movements (The boxers in China, for instance) but even its influence in the happen of both World Wars as well as the significance of liberation in the ancient colonies for better or worst, the emancipation and adhesion of Turkey into the same entrails of the Western hemisphere in the second decade of XX century, among other consequences. But there is so much conceptual material to discuss, state and argue that this little review is simply quite short to intend to expose, that it's better to take a profound reading around this invaluable essay that claimed for being exposed.

A text of maxim interest for all kind of readers.

The thesis is strong, but the argument is weak.......2002-08-20

Arno Mayer's "The Furies" show the qualities that were present in his two previous works on, respectively, pre-1914 Europe and the Holocaust. They are based on secondary sources, and they clearly articulate a theme that had been percolating through the historiography of their subject. "The Furies" is a comparative history of the French and English revolutions and is divided into five parts. The first deals with "conceptual signposts" such as revolution, counterrevolution, violence, terror, vengeance and religion. The second part is an overview of the process of the terror, the third looks at "metropolitian condescension and rural distrust," the fourth looks at the revolutions' challenges to the bigotry of the established church and the fifth looks at the international context of Napoleon and Stalin.

Why did the Furies arise? Mayer emphasizes such aggravating factors as domestic and foreign counter-revolution, the collapse of the old state, and personal and popular vengenace. There was considerable ideological fanaticism, but it was as much effect as cause of the violence. On Russia he declares "Even in normal times, let alone in a time of troubles, Russia defied governance as a single unit--a single sovereignty--by virtue not only of its sheer expanse but also its bewildering diversity of cultures, its uneven levels of development, its primitive state of transport, and its encumbrance by a torpid peasant world. The rich but refractory endowment of vastness, diversity, and unsimultaneity was at least as burdensome as the enduring deficit of democratic thought and praxis." (233-34)

Although there is much to be said that for that last statment, ultimately this is a disappointing book. A synthesis is rarely more than the sum of its part and Mayer's work suffers from the fact that the literature on French and Russian terror is less sophisticated than work on, say, the Holocaust. Mayer cannot read Russian, and while he can read French he is not an expert on 18th century French history. Much of the book consists of competent, uninspired narrative detailing the course of atrocities (but oddly enough omits the Prairial executions).

There are other conceptual weaknesses. Mayer states (4) that revolutions cannot exist without religious conflict. But the Chinese civil war and revolution cannot really be considered one. His discussion of peasant rebellion in France does not emphasize that much of Peasant France either did not rebel or did support the republic (326-28). He dismisses the American revolution as insufficiently revolutionary (26) on the grounds that it was a "restoration"; but this begs the question of how the American colonies received these glorious institutions in the first place.

The comparative discussion on Napoleon and Stalin is too long (533-701) and much of it consists of padded history. Oddly enough Mayer does not mention Orlando Figes' vicious circle of conscription: the Bolsheviks needed to form an army but economic crisis made them unable to feed it. So mass desertion resulted, requiring further conscription and more strains on the economy. Nor does he mention the arguments of Lars Lih and William G. Rosenberg on the pervasiveness of the economic crisis.

More could have be done to criticize the ideological determinism of the Furet school. More use could have been made of Timothy Tackett's massively documented work on the National Assembly and about their pragmatic, non-philosophe nature. Mayer could have mentioned Barry Shapiro and the moderate attitude of the 1789-91 authorities to rumours of counter-revolutionary plots. He could have noted Emma Rothschild's portrait of a pluralist, liberal Condorcet. On the other hand Mayer does point out that Burke stated before the outbreak of the war that the revolutionaries had no right to expect civilized warfare (121). It is interesting to hear de Tocqueville complain that the philosophes are unfairly denigrated in contemporary France (46). It is important to notes that when Pope Pius VI condemned the Civil Constitution of the clergy he not only criticized its ham-handed nature but the very idea of granting non-Catholics toleration at all (427-30). Mayer does remind us that counter-revolutionaries are more than capable of terror, and one should remember the 20,000 slaughtered by the Russians in one day in Warsaw in 1794, or the 30,000 killed when Britian suppresed an Irish bid for independence in 1798. One should especially remember the 150,000 Haitians who died (30% of the total) resisting Napoleon's attempt to re-establish slavery there. In conclusion there is much to be said for the thesis, but the argument could use more work.

Fascinating study of counter-revolutionary violence.......2001-08-04

In this book, Mayer studies the French Revolution of 1789 and the Russian Revolution of 1917. He seeks to explain why the peoples made these great revolutionary advances, and also why the nobility fought to destroy them and to restore the savage old orders. He studies the role of religion in the counter-revolutions, particularly the Papacy's bitter hostility to the Revolutions, compared to its notorious slap on the wrist for the Nazi counter-revolution. He cites Michelet's famous remark that the numbers killed by the Spanish Inquisition in just one province of Spain far exceeded the number killed by those defending France and its Revolution. The Inquisition was the crowning revelation of Christianity's ingrained violence, its hostility to people who dared to think for themselves, and to think differently from the Church: for six centuries, the leaders of the Catholic Church ordered the killing of millions of men and women for the glory of God. After the French Revolution, the British ruling class organised the foreign counter-revolutionary war. This enormously increased the economic, social and military difficulties faced by the new Government. Later in the war, Napoleon continued France's defence against the counter-revolution, upheld the Revolution's destruction of the nobility's privileges, and extended its gains abroad. After the end of World War One, the rulers of the British, US and French states united in `helping the Whites overthrow the Bolshevik regime', as Mayer writes. Their intervention prolonged the civil war, enormously increasing the suffering of the Soviet people, and adding to the huge economic, social and military difficulties faced by the new Government. Stalin played a key part in defending the Soviet Union against the Intervention; later, he expanded the Revolution's gains and, after defeating Hitler's counter-revolutionary intervention, extended these gains to the nations of Eastern Europe. However, studies that focus on the violence and terror involved in counter-revolutions, even those studies, like Mayer's, that explain why people defended their countries' Revolutions, tend to overlook those Revolutions' tremendous achievements. Of course, people fought to survive the furies of the counter-revolution, but they also fought to build better societies, and they succeeded.

East Meets West: The Russian Trumpet Tradition from the Time of Peter the Great to the October Revolution, With a Lexicon of Trumpeters Active in Russia ... the Historical Brass Society Series, 4)

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East Meets West: The Russian Trumpet Tradition from the Time of Peter the Great to the October Revolution, With a Lexicon of Trumpeters Active in Russia ... the Historical Brass Society Series, 4)
Edward H. Tarr
Manufacturer: Pendragon Press
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ASIN: 1576470288

Women, the State and Revolution: Soviet Family Policy and Social Life, 19171936 (Cambridge Russian, Soviet and Post-Soviet Studies)

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Two thumbs up!

Women, the State and Revolution: Soviet Family Policy and Social Life, 19171936 (Cambridge Russian, Soviet and Post-Soviet Studies)
Wendy Z. Goldman
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521458161

Book Description

When the Bolsheviks came to power in 1917, they believed that under socialism the family would "wither-away." They envisioned a society in which communal dining halls, daycare centers, and public laundries would replace the unpaid labor of women in the home. Yet by 1936 legislation designed to liberate women from their legal and economic dependence had given way to increasingly conservative solutions aimed at strengthening traditional family ties and women's reproductive role. This book explains the reversal, focusing on how women, peasants, and orphans responded to Bolshevik attempts to remake the family, and how their opinions and experiences in turn were used by the state to meet its own needs.

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Two thumbs up!.......2001-09-06

The book provided an excellent insight as to the troubles facing women, children and families following he Bolshevik revolution. The book is relevant for anyone studying gender issues in the early 20th century as well as those interested in Russian history. The book is extremely easy to read; however, it does at times get bogged down in overuse of statistical data. The data fully supports the author's conclusions, but at times the smooth flow of the book is interrupted by too many examples. Overall, the book was extremely easy to read and provided good historical and analytical coverage of the problems facing women, children and families in post-revolutionary Russia.

Passage Through Armageddon: The Russians in War and Revolution, 1914-1918

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Passage Through Armageddon: The Russians in War and Revolution, 1914-1918
W. Bruce Lincoln
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0671557092

Revolution on My Mind: Writing a Diary Under Stalin

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Revolution on My Mind: Writing a Diary Under Stalin
Jochen Hellbeck
Manufacturer: Harvard University Press
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Book Description

Revolution on My Mind is a stunning revelation of the inner world of Stalin's Russia. We see into the minds and hearts of Soviet citizens who recorded their lives during an extraordinary period of revolutionary fervor and state terror. Writing a diary, like other creative expression, seems nearly impossible amid the fear and distrust of totalitarian rule; but as Jochen Hellbeck shows, diary-keeping was widespread, as individuals struggled to adjust to Stalin's regime.

Rather than protect themselves against totalitarianism, many men and women bent their will to its demands, by striving to merge their individual identities with the collective and by battling vestiges of the old self within. We see how Stalin's subjects, from artists to intellectuals and from students to housewives, absorbed directives while endeavoring to fulfill the mandate of the Soviet revolution--re-creation of the self as a builder of the socialist society. Thanks to a newly discovered trove of diaries, we are brought face to face with individual life stories--gripping and unforgettably poignant.

The diarists' efforts defy our liberal imaginations and our ideals of autonomy and private fulfillment. These Soviet citizens dreamed differently. They coveted a morally and aesthetically superior form of life, and were eager to inscribe themselves into the unfolding revolution. Revolution on My Mind is a brilliant exploration of the forging of the revolutionary self, a study without precedent that speaks to the evolution of the individual in mass movements of our own time.

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Footnotes out of Control
Bunin didn't call this book "Cursed Days" for nothing!
Picture of everyday confusion & fears of the 1917 revolution

Cursed Days: Diary of a Revolution
Ivan Bunin
Manufacturer: Ivan R. Dee, Publisher
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ASIN: 1566631866

Book Description

The Nobel PrizeDwinning author's great anti-Bolshevik diary of the Russian Revolution, translated into English for the first time, with an Introduction and Notes by Thomas Gaiton Marullo. A harrowing description of the forerunners of the concentration camps and the Gulag. --Marc Raeff

Customer Reviews:

Footnotes out of Control.......2007-03-16

I don't recall ever reading a book where the footnotes left the strongest impression. However, "Cursed Days" by Ivan Bunin had that effect on me. The book itself is rather good. It is the author's diary during the period on and after the Russian Revolution. Bunin comes across as something of a monarchist who looks disdainfully on all the rabble that has created this cauldron of chaos. Frankly, I may have reacted the same way, especially given the observations he has compiled in "Cursed Days". I suspect most readers would sympathize somewhat with his perspective as well. I doubt there are many in the 21st Century who look back on the Russian Revolution as one of the major enhancements of the 20th Century (although, whenever there's an international economic summit, it seems to correspond with a convention individuals who probably DO think that highly of the Russian Revolution). Anyway, Bunin's day by day accounting of the facts, rumors, and impressions of the revolt are worth the price of the book. The book essentially comes in three parts; The author's observations in Moscow in 1918, his observations in Odessa in 1919, and excerpts of subsequent writing relevant to the topic of the Revolution. The first two segments generally carry an impression of the near-constant uncertainty that most people faced. There were threats of famine, murder, pogroms, counter-revolutionary backlash, etc.. Somehow, Bunin seems to make do throughout though there are times his own fears are candidly shared. Eventually, he is able to escape Russia although not all of his diary made it with him. I especially appreciated the accounts of the on-going civil war that is probably the least reported aspects of the Russian Revolution.

In regards to the footnotes that irritated me; they were at the bottom of nearly every page. Generally, I like fotenotes; at least the kind that supplement the information presented (as opposed to merely citing chapter and verse). However, the Translator and editor, Thomas Gaiton Marullo, somehow felt the need to overdo it. The best way to make the point is that he footnoted an explanation of every name, place, and periodical that was mentioned in the diary. Those accounted for roughly two-thirds of the footnotes and served as speed bumps to nowhere; at least they did for me. I didn't need to know the exact location of every town mentioned nor of the publisher or authors of every newspaper, magazine or book cited. I'll admit that about half of the names mentioned deserved a note or two but the other half could have remained in obscurity. I DID appreciate the comments on the various rumors that Bunin mentioned; Marullo lets us know which ones were true and which weren't. As a person who is in the habit of reading all footnotes on the bottom of the page, I was exasperated on how they interfered with the flow of the book. I would suggest that the reader would do better to just read the book and then go back over the notes later. You'll probably come away with a better impression of both (or at least a better impression than I had).

Bunin didn't call this book "Cursed Days" for nothing!.......1999-08-08

The previous customer review refers haughtily to the "hauteur" of Ivan Bunin, a "right-wing, upper class novelist." Say what? Bunin, a master of Russian prose, was understandably aghast as he watched the sudden, violent and senseless destruction of the glorious Russian culture. The reviewer sneers that "the folk, in Bunin's opinion, were ignorant, gullible, violent, dirty, and totally unfit to take a hand in government." Well, it sounds like Bunin got it just about right! Just look what the left-wing thugs ruling in the name of "the folk" did to Russia for the next 70 years.

Strangely, Soviet leaders decided that "Cursed Days" was unsuitable for consumption by "the folk." Hmmm... Talk about hauteur! Only in recent years was the publication of this amazing diary permitted in Bunin's homeland, and now - thanks to Thomas Gaiton Marullo's splendid translation - English-speaking readers can finally see that there were some people who weren't fooled in 1917. I just hope that modern readers will read Bunin's prophetic diary of those cursed days... and remember.

Neal McCabe

Picture of everyday confusion & fears of the 1917 revolution.......1998-08-28

This day-to-day diary of the confusion and fears that confronted those who lived through Russia's revolutions and their aftermaths in 1917-19 is well worth reading. However, it has its frustrations, especially a) the unremitting tone of hauteur by this right-wing, upper class novelist when confronted by the ascendant working class, and b) the editor's feeling that every rumor reported by Bunin, no matter how outlandish (St. Petersburg has fallen to the Germans; "The Red Army has been chased from Russia") requires his footnote assuring us that "The rumor was not true". Although both are very different in focus from this book, I much preferred Bulgakov's The White Guard, an autobiographically fictional account of his life during the same time period, with the same confusion, in Kiev, and Sukhanov's The Russian Revolution, 1917, an almost hour-by-hour description of the actual government takeovers in 1917.

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