Bibliograph

Revolutionary Russia, 1891 - 1991, a history, Orlando Figes

Type

Label

Revolutionary Russia, 1891 - 1991, a history, Orlando Figes

Language

eng

Bibliography note

Includes bibliographical references (pages 297-308) and index

Index

index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

Revolutionary Russia, 1891 - 1991

Nature of contents

bibliography

Oclc number

862575182

Responsibility statement

Orlando Figes

Sub title

a history

Summary

In this elegant and incisive account, Orlando Figes offers an illuminating new perspective on the Russian Revolution. While other historians have focused their examinations on the cataclysmic years immediately before and after 1917, Figes shows how the revolution, while it changed in form and character, nevertheless retained the same idealistic goals throughout, from its origins in the famine crisis of 1891 until its end with the collapse of the Soviet regime in 1991. Figes traces three generational phases: Lenin and the Bolsheviks, who set the pattern of destruction and renewal until their demise in the terror of the 1930s; the Stalinist generation, promoted from the lower classes, who created the lasting structures of the Soviet regime and consolidated its legitimacy through victory in war; and the generation of 1956, shaped by the revelations of Stalin's crimes and committed to "making the Revolution work" to remedy economic decline and mass disaffection. Until the very end of the Soviet system, its leaders believed they were carrying out the revolution Lenin had begun. With the authority and distinctive style that have marked his magisterial histories, Figes delivers an accessible and paradigm-shifting reconsideration of one of the defining events of the twentieth century. -- Publisher description

Table Of Contents

The start -- The "dress rehearsal" -- Last hopes -- War and revolution -- The February Revolution -- Lenin's revolution -- Civil War and the making of the Soviet system -- Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin -- The revolution's golden age? -- The great break -- Stalin's crisis -- Communism in retreat? -- The great terror -- Revolution for export -- War and revolution -- Revolution and Cold War -- The beginning of the end -- Mature socialism -- The last bolshevik -- Judgement

Classification