Looking at the rise and fall of the communist state, this textbook examines the history of the Soviet Union between 1910 and 1991, meeting the needs of the latest GCSE exam criteria.
Presents a new perspective on the Russian Revolution, tracing three generational phases to show how the revolution, while it changed in form and character, retained the same idealistic goals throughout.
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 has provided fresh perspectives from which to view the Revolution out of which it grew. The Russian Revolution, 1917-1921, by Ronald Kowalski, reviews the ever-changing debate on the nature of the Russian Revolution. This collection of documents and sources includes: * newspapers, memoirs and literature * commentary and background information of each source * a narrative of the major events of the period * new material made available since the policy of glasnost * a re-examination of World War One and the Revolution * focus on thematic issues such as the actions of peasants and workers. For students of European history this will provide interesting and informative reading on this major event in Russia's turbulent past.
A groundbreaking, inclusive history of the Russian Revolution for "those who want to discover what really happened to Russia" (The New York Times Book Review) A "monumental study" (Wall Street Journal), enthralling in its narrative of a movement whose purpose, in the words of Leon Trotsky, was "to overthrow the world," The Russian Revolution draws conclusions that have aroused great controversy. Richard Pipes argues convincingly that the Russian Revolution was an intellectual, rather than a class, uprising; that it was steeped in terror from its very outset; and that it was not a revolution at all but a coup d'etat—"the capture of governmental power by a small minority."
Brimming with the honesty and passionate conviction for which he has become famous, Victor Serge's account of the first year of the Russian Revolution--through all of its achievements and challenges--captures both the heroism of the mass upsurge that gave birth to soviet democracy, and the crippling circumstances that began to chip away at its historic gains. Year One of the Russian Revolution is Serge's attempt to defend the early days of the revolution against those, like Stalin, who would claim its legacy as justification for the repression of dissent within Russia.
The Russian Revolution, 1905-1921 is a new history of Russia's revolutionary era as a story of experience-of people making sense of history as it unfolded in their own lives and as they took part in making history themselves. The major events, trends, and explanations, reaching from Bloody Sunday in 1905 to the final shots of the civil war in 1921, are viewed through the doubled perspective of the professional historian looking backward and the contemporary journalist reporting and interpreting history as it happened. The volume then turns toward particular places and people: city streets, peasant villages, the margins of empire (Central Asia, Ukraine, the Jewish Pale), women and men, workers and intellectuals, artists and activists, utopian visionaries, and discontents of all kinds. We spend time with the famous (Vladimir Lenin, Lev Trotsky, Alexandra Kollontai, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Isaac Babel) and with those whose names we don't even know. Key themes include difference and inequality (social, economic, gendered, ethnic), power and resistance, violence, and ideas about justice and freedom. Written especially for students and general readers, this history relies extensively on contemporary texts and voices in order to bring the past and its meanings to life. This is a history about dramatic and uncertain times and especially about the interpretations, values, emotions, desires, and disappointments that made history matter to those who lived it.
Now in a new edition, this provocative, highly readable work presents a fascinating look at events that culminated in the Russian Revolution. Focusing on the Revolution in its widest sense, Sheila Fitzpatrick covers not only the events of 1917 and what preceded them, but the social transformations brought about by the Bolsheviks.
Analyses the events of the 1917 revolution in Russia, from its roots in the Russian empire of the late nineteenth century through to the revolutionary years of 1917-24 and beyond. Considers the legacy for the Soviet Union, right up to the fall of communism in 1989-91, and surveys the revolution's influence on the twentieth-century world. Suggested level: secondary.