Doctor Zhivago

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 rare novel.......2007-09-30

After reading famous books you often feel that whilst it was good, you can't quite understand why it has become so renowned. Perhaps it is because the idea is powerful but badly executed or perhaps has an incredible mood but the concept and importance are somewhat lacking. None of these feelings occur when reading Dr Zhivago, its artistry is superb, the dialogues and turns of phrase are often breathtaking in their subtle importance, beauty or both. This is a book that fully warrants its reputation, it is stripped of the idealism and runs almost like a political philosophy discourse at times in the development of ideas of equality, the human spirit and the paths to progress in society.

It is for this reason that I don't think the book deserves its reputation as a 'love story': it is certainly a human story with love becoming more important as a theme as the book continues, but the power of the context is such that one could say that it is a political book first and a romance second. However, such hierarchies are not applicable in a work such as Dr Zhivago, such is Pasternak's skill as a writer that the themes of the novel perfectly complement each other, he balances the issues of the history of the era, Yury's development as a person and the underlying current of the women in his life with almost orchestral skill. If Pasternak's aim was to create an illustration of the power, subtlety and synphonic nature of life, uncontrollable by 'men of action' then this is reflected in the structure and style of his prose.

The book had a great effect on me, its integrity was great and the whole book wonderfully honest. Each comment was razor blade sharp so I was often completely surprised that he was brave enough to write such things in Soviet Russia. He seems to have paid for his integrity with his life, echoing the life of his main character in this way and in many others. I would be unsurprised if Pasternak only wrote one novel on this scale; he seems to have put everything of himself into it.

The prose is not always pleasurable to read, it's even dull in places such as the chapter-long train journey. I also would have preferred a greater mix with descriptions and dialogues, there were few sections when the two were sufficiently mixed so that the reader has to often read very lengthy dialogues and intermitable (though often startlingly beautiful) descriptions. I experienced East of Eden by Steinbeck in a similar way: it was often not pleasurable so much as enlightening and a book that one should try to read at least one time in your life.

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.

Jewish and Russian Revolutionaries Exiled to Siberia, 1901-1917 (Jewish Studies)

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Jewish and Russian Revolutionaries Exiled to Siberia, 1901-1917 (Jewish Studies)
Philip Desind
Manufacturer: Edwin Mellen Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0773497625

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)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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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.

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

Average customer rating:

great book
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
ProductGroup: Book
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.

Customer Reviews:

great book.......2007-07-15

This book is absolutely great. I had a few problems with my shipement but Amazon Custom Service people were very nice to solve them.

Regards,
Celeste Murillo

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
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0671557092

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Those bloody Reds.
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
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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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:

Those bloody Reds........2007-09-05

Ivan Bunin would have you believe that the Ancient Regime in Czarist Russia was a kind, benovolent regime. Most historians know that is not the case. Bunin would like you to believe that it is. Bunin records his beliefs on the Russian Civil War. His observation was from Moscow and Odessa. He describes the brutality of the Reds and how they treated people. The Reds may have been more brutal, but both the Czarist and Communist regimes had very difficult problems with respecting human rights. Both killed people.

I found his memories of these days interesting. They should not be read as a disinterested observer of the new order. He was very vocal about the Reds, and viewed the Whites as a hope of mankind (which they were not). However, this story gives a view of the Russian Revolution from a member of a class that lost it all.

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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True Decadence
Uneven, and only Mildly Interesting
Existentialism without the pompousness of Camus & Sartre
Why mess with an Overcoat?

Novel with Cocaine (European Classics)
M. Ageyev
Manufacturer: Northwestern University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Customer Reviews:

True Decadence.......2004-06-10

This strange little tale of a young man's descent into cocaine addiction is less interesting for it's portrayal of the youthful anti-hero's chemical use as his astounding philosophical insights. Vadim does not actually use cocaine until the end of the novel ('the beginning of the end', as it were) and the novel is mostly composed of his Dostoevskian self loathing and inability to relate to his peers on any level. It is almost an exercise in depressive solipsism; while Vadim's peers play a large role in the novel his inner world is so tortured and miles apart from them that the author might as well have portrayed him as a complete misanthrope. In the opening we get a feel for where his moral compass is swinging; he gives a venereal disease to a young woman in full cognizance of what he is doing. He agonizes over it, but this does not prevent him from actually doing it. The most catching scenes in the novel are when his classmates, thrown into a kind of cocaine induced revolt against the orthodoxy of the school they attend, verbally attack priests and teachers. Burkewitz, a character we encounter later in the book, gives a particularly interesting speech to the headmaster priest of the school in the middle of a sermon. There are thoroughly disturbing scenes; Vadim strikes his mother, steals from her, all the while recognizing her basic goodness and frail attempts to relate to him. Vadim wants to consider himself exceptional, a unique student and son, and at the same time loathes himself. Many of his self evaluations strike a schizoid note. His entrance into the world of cocaine use is preceded by his rejection of a girl with whom he was too fearful to consummate his relationship. Like everyone else, she has a false image of him and rejects him entirely when he fails to live up to it. We are only given blurry pictures of the lengths to which he goes to obtain cocaine after a few seamy scenes in which his 'friends' instruct him in the mechanics of use. "My son is a thief", his mother wails. Vadim's disturbing coke dreams are not of the usual variety; far from being visions of grandiosity, they are unconscious and violent recognitions of his own guilt and wretchedness. I wouldn't hesitate to say that this is one of the most bizarre novels I have ever encountered. It oscillates between philosophy, self loathing and insanity, and does not strike an even balance. I would recommend it to anyone, not for knowledge of a cocaine addict's world (this is not a realistic depiction) but as a jolting primer for any study or enjoyment of the literature of decadence.

Uneven, and only Mildly Interesting.......2002-05-24

This book had been so built up by other people who had read it that I expected more. The writing is uneven and the first two thirds of the book seem to have almost no relation to the last third.
The first two thirds of the book gave a few interesting details of life in Russia just before the Revolution, but other than that I foundit very uninteresting. It is not until alomst the end of the book that the element of cocaine is even introduced and when it is the book quickly winds to its unsurprising end.

Existentialism without the pompousness of Camus & Sartre.......2000-08-10

Having already been a fan of Dostoevsky & Tolstoy, it was Charles Bukowski who pointed me back to the Russians as being the only producers of literature that's worth reading. "A Novel with Cocaine" is a fine example of a novel that has something worthwhile on its pages.

Might we say that it's existentialist in it thinking? The individual caught in a universe that really doesn't give a damn about the individual... and the individual's struggle to find something to do, and a place to fit.

Camus and Sartre are puny little runts compared to Ageyev! Ageyev gives us the moment-to-moment REAL stuff that actually matters. One character goes up in front of his high school math classs to work out a problem... he sneezes and boogers are hanging out of his face while the class laughs. How does he deal with this?

Ageyev keeps his work as something regular folks can identify with. Not all of his situations deal with boogers (or things just as gross), but they're all common enough to keep a reader's interest without drawing the reader into pompous brain-teasers that few of us can access.

Conversely, Camus and Sartre take us into a high-minded realm which is interesting, but when will I ever have to think about whether or not to kill a wheelchair-bound guy because he doesn't have the nerve to do it himself? How many of our lives are impacted by such decisions?

Ageyev is much more interesting. He's a great writer. He's got a great sense of humor and he's FIRMLY rooted in common existence.

Though the book is titled "A Novel with Cocaine," sure there's a great deal about the main characters travels through the underworld of drugs and drug people and the activities between them. But, I think that this is more of a way for the writer to access his more interesting ideas--as opposed to writing a book that's really about cocaine.

Why mess with an Overcoat?

.......1996-08-08

Losing his "nasal virginity" in an adventure into the wonders and horrors of cocaine addiction, the central character finds his answer to insecurity and social ineptitude in a potent white powder as his peer in The Overcoat seeks the same comfort in a dark, tattered garment.

If the pseudonym doesn't give it away, this anonymous author provides another dim glance into nineteenth century St. Petersberg that seems a brushstroke within the same portrait alongside those by Gogol and Dostoevsky. Imagine the Underground Man not tormenting his maid, but out in the streets snorting cocaine, searching for a female companion.

Novel with Cocaine is not essential reading, but it is another worthwhile glimpse at the literary products of desperate and dark nineteenth century St. Petersberg. Glorification of drug use is a problem in the late twentieth century. Novel with Cocaine will force you to think again with grave reluctance that neither McInerney nor Ellis have been able to posit in the minds of their readers.

Critical Companion to the Russian Revolution 1914-1921
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Critical Companion to Russian Revolutions

Excellent but loosely coordinated essays

Critical Companion to the Russian Revolution 1914-1921

Manufacturer: Indiana University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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

ASIN: 0253333334

Amazon.com

Drawing on the work of dozens of scholars from Russia, Europe, Japan, and the United States, this encyclopedic volume provides a useful overview of the early years of the Soviet Union. Among the topics covered are the collapse of the moderate Kerensky government and the rise of Bolshevik power, the sweeping militarization of Soviet society (the Red Army had 4,400,000 regulars in 1920), and the contribution of members of the Russian intelligentsia to the apparatus of the Soviet state. Students of Soviet history will find this compendium, which weighs in at nearly 800 pages, to be a valuable resource.

Customer Reviews:

Critical Companion to Russian Revolutions.......2003-01-14

This is a solid, definitive, wide-ranging and in-depth look at the Revolutions told from a variety of viewpoints, ideologies and mindsets. Modeled after the Foucoult/Ozuf Critical Dictionary of the French Revolution, this is an excellently assembled book, with very current material, well worth having by any scholar of this period.

Excellent but loosely coordinated essays.......1999-12-31

This book is a necessary addition to the library of anyone who already knows a fair amount about the Russian Revolution and Russian Civil War. It provides for the first time in one volume the advances in understanding that result from availability of Soviet archives and close cooperation between Western and Russian scholars. It also points out numerous topics on which further research would be useful.

However, it has its flaws. Some topics are covered redundantly in various essays, and not always the ones one would expect; other topics get inadequate attention. Makhno's anarchist army in Ukraine, for example, is barely mentioned in Mark von Hagen's essay on Ukraine, given an unsympathetic paragraph in Vladimir Chernaiv's essay on anarchists, and a longer and somewhat more useful paragraph in Orlando Figes' essay on peasant armies. Given that at times Makhno's army was the most effective military force in Eastern Ukraine, and that all other combatants in Ukraine had to worry about what Makhno was going to do next, this is fragmented and incomplete treatment of an important topic. As another example, the description of what happened in Latvia between 1917 and 1920 is seriously incomplete; the bitter division between pro-Bolshevik and Latvian nationalist elements is not brought out clearly, nor is the intensity of the war that took place in Latvia, with many Latvians, German troops (the von der Goltz Iron Division) and some Russians (the Bermondt-Avalov force) on one side, and the Latvian Bolsheviks and the Red Army on the other. One would not guess from this book how disastrous this was for Latvia; by the end of the fighting, about half the population of Latvia had fled the country or died.

Rather than cite other such topics, I'll turn to the observation that most of the bibliographies of these essays consist mainly of secondary rather than primary sources. This is a drawback in a book which implicitly assumes that the reader already has a general familiarity with the subject matter. To be sure, not all primary sources that presumably exist are accessible even now; in particular, one suspects that somewhere in British government archives are documents that would clear up various puzzling issues. But there is a conspicuous lack of references to the extensive German political and military archives related to the Russian Revolution and Civil War. Indeed, the German role is so incompletely treated that one suspects some of the authors are, quite understanably, not familiar with this material. But from 1917 through mid-1919 the Germans deliberately shifted their weight to keep any of the forces contesting for power in Russia from winning a clear victory; the Germans occupied here, distributed weapons there, stirred up trouble over yonder, and generally tried to make sure that revolution and civil war in Russia would not spread to Germany. A careful discussion of German policy and its effects on the course of events in the first half of the Russian Civil War would be extremely helpful; lacking that, a good bibliography of the primary sources in German would be most useful.

Despite these criticisms, the book is a big step forward in understanding what really happened and who did what to whom in the Russian Revolution and Russian Civil War. I hope that a decade or two from now there will be a second edition clarifying some of the topics not easily understood from this first edition.

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Revisionism

Not bad intro book--would not read if I wanted an anthology though

Concise to a fault

The Russian Revolution did not end in 1920.

A Look at a 15-Year Long Revolution

The Russian Revolution
Sheila Fitzpatrick
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0192802046

Book Description

The Russian Revolution had a decisive impact on the history of the twentieth century. Now, following the collapse of the Soviet regime and the opening of its archives, it is possible to step back and see the full picture. In this classic work, the author incorporates data from archives that were previously inaccessible not only to Western but also to Soviet historians, as well as drawing on important recent Russian publications such as the memoirs of one of the great survivors of Soviet politics, Vyacheslav Molotov. Impeccable in its scholarship and objectivity, the book tells a gripping story of a Marxist revolution that was intended to transform the world, visited enormous suffering on the Russian people, and, like the French Revolution before it, ended up by devouring its own children. In a concluding section that will be of great interest to scholars in the field as well as the general reader, the author treats the Stalinist Great Purges as the last act of the drama of the Russian Revolution.

Customer Reviews:

Revisionism.......2006-09-11

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.

Not bad intro book--would not read if I wanted an anthology though.......2006-04-07

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.

Concise to a fault.......2004-06-15

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).

The Russian Revolution did not end in 1920........2003-02-10

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.

A Look at a 15-Year Long Revolution.......2003-01-10

As the title indicates, the gist of Fitzpatrick's argument is that the Russian Revolution was not completed until 1932. Only at this time did the contours of Russian society become stable. Massive numbers of proletariats were educated and became bureaucrats who helped achieve Russian industrialization.

Other points in this book are that: (1) The Bolshevik party was a mass party in 1917. Lenin was no murdering dictator but was a persuasive leader. His threat to resign from the party pushed the decision to sign the Brest-Litovsk treaty. (2) The peasants were suspicious of the Bolshevik aims to ignite class hatred in the countryside. The Bolsheviks needed to send thugs into the countryside to wage war on a reluctant peasantry in order to force industrialization on the nation.

Although this book is relatively short, especially considering the time period covered, it is very meaty and requires careful reading to understand the main concepts.

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