Nikolai Sukhanov: Chronicler of the Russian Revolution

by I. Getzler

Overview

Sukhanov stood at the centre of the Russian revolution as a founding member and ideologist of the Petrograd Soviet and as fearless editor of the leading opposition newspaper. His seven-volume eyewitness memoir of the major events of the Russian revolution is peopled by such leading figures as Lenin, Trotsky, Martov, Chernov, Tsereteli and many more. In the 1920s he stood out in courageous opposition to those of his fellow economists who prepared the Communist Party for Stalin's brutal collectivization. Found guilty at the farcical Menshevik show-trial of 1931 and subsequently victim of a trumped-up charge of spying for Germany, he was shot in 1940 and only rehabilitated in 1992. His fate epitomizes the tragedy of those Russian intellectuals who sought an accommodation with the Communist dictatorship and were destroyed by it.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780333970355
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan UK
Publication date:	12/03/2001
Series:	St Antony's Series
Edition description:	2002
Pages:	226
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.03(d)

About the Author

ISRAEL GETZLER was born in 1920 in Berlin and spent the war years in Soviet Russia. He is the author of Martov: A Political Biography of a Russian Social Democrat, Neither Toleration Nor Favor: The Australian Chapter of Jewish Emancipation, Kronstadt: The Fate of a Soviet Democracy, and of numerous articles and chapters in scholarly journals and books.

Table of Contents

Preface Glossary Introduction Champion of the Russian Village Commune Ideologist of the February Revolution Chronicler of Russia's Democratic Revolution In Opposition to the Bolshevik 'Jacobin' Dictatorship Knight Errant of the Obshchina Sukhanov at the Menshevik Trial Notes Appendices Bibliography Index

Editorial Reviews

'It is a splendid piece of work, almost a work of scholarly benediction: the message comes through that Sukhanov, much maligned and neglected for decades, was in fact one of the great moral forces in both the history and historiography of the Russian Revolution.' - Robert Service, St Antony's College, Oxford

'This important work will be essential reading for all serious students of the Russian revolution.' - James D. White, Slavic Review

From the Publisher

[This] is a splendid piece of work....

Robert Service

A political biography of a member of the Russian radical intelligentsia who was a founding member of the Petrograd Soviet in February 1917 and was later executed by Stalin for his vocal opposition to the brutal collectivization of the Russian peasantry. The author discusses his prolific publishing career and advocacy for socialist causes; his criticism of the Czar, the Mensheviks, Lenin, and Stalin; his opposition to preventive censorship; his month-long journey in the rural areas of the Soviet Union investigating the results of collectivization; and his 1937 trial and subsequent 1940 execution on charges of spying for Germany and engaging in anti- Soviet agitation. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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