A People's Tragedy: A History of the Russian Revolution

Rating:
Summary: Detailed, fair, engaging, and gratifying
Review: "A People's Tragedy" is a rather detailed account of the Russian Revolution which maintains an excellent balance of erudition and lucidity. Figes convincingly presents the revolution as a 33-year process involving many contending interests without ever losing his focus on the eventual replacement of Tsarism with Communism.

The first few chapters address the state of the Romanov regime in the decades preceding its overthrow, various parliamentary and cultural movements at the turn of the century, and the organization of the peasantry following the abolition of serfdom. This background information later proves essential. One can see, for example, how the land management and village self-governance of the peasants led to the soviet structure used by the victorious Reds. Figes revisits these themes throughout the book, depicting a Romanov dynasty that was more bumbling autocracy than cruel tyranny and raising the peasants from their usual role as a haplessly oppressed mass to a significant political force.

I found the treatment of the Bolsheviks to be relatively sympathetic, and the book does not suffer because of it. They are depicted as a ruthless and especially fortunate revolutionary faction, a group ready to use any means necessary to obtain power but, in the end, given a gift with the success of their unlikely coup. Some readers may find this insufficiently damning but, while I would have liked a little more about how the nature of the revolution affected later developments, the abominable governance which followed is not Figes's topic.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating history
Review: As many previous reviewers noted, analysis is sorely lacking. Anecdotal evidence on the level 'he said, she said' is not enough proof of many of the author's claims. Being a native of St-Petersburg and well indoctrinated in my teens by Communist school system, I must say that Figes didn't dig deep into all those 'recently opened' archives.

He often relies on the old Communist sources, such as memoirs of the 'revolutionary workers' and mid- and low-level party bureaucrats. Those were written by ghostwriters under strict guidance from party ideologists and censors and are nothing more than a 'fantasy' version of the events that took place during the revolution.

A good example is Figes' description of Gorky's adolescence. The myth of Gorky's teenage years as destitute and homeless was thoroughly debunked in the 90's, yet we get the same old peachfuzz on how Gorky was a burlak on Volga when he was 12. This sort of thing is persistent throughout the book. His reasoning and 'analysis' of the events that led to the February revolution might as well be taken from the Soviet school book circa 1979. So boo! boo!

Rating:
Summary: Haunting and unforgettable
Review: Figes manages to cover all of the major events leading up to, including and immediately following the Russian Revolution with a broad, almost cinematic, sweep. The signifcance and details of the events of the revolution are covered in exacting detail, but what makes this book truly important is the focus on the individuals. The Russian Revolution was an event that completely and drastically changed a nation, but Figes does not fall in the trap of focusing only on the broader aspects; he captures the story of soldier, peasant, revolutionary, bourgeiosie, and common individual through the harrowing events of the revolution. He lets the people tell their own stories--stories of feverish revolution, of the betrayal of a nation, of tragedy, and horror. The images of these stories are seared permanently into your consciousness.

A People's Tragedy is a long book, but most definitely, worth the time it takes to read it. For any student of Russian history, it will shake up your dry and academic notions about the revolution. Figes' book places a distinctly human face on all of the events of the revolution, and the faces and stories are ones that you will not soon forget.

Rating:
Summary: Academic Trash
Review: If one is interested in the history of the October revolution, one need not read obscure academic riff raff of this speculating fool. A people's tragedy? The real tragedy is that in 1891 more than half of Russia's populace couldn't read or write! Read Trotsky's "History of the Russian Revolution."

Rating:
Summary: Finest all-around history of the Revolution
Review: One of the difficulties in selecting books on Russia, is that so many come with a built-in perspective and ideology. Facts which support a thesis are included, those which do not are conveniently ignored.
Of all the histories of Russia for the period prior to and during the Revolution, in my view this is the finest. From Figes we certainly get the big picture, and not only the key events, but also insight into Russian culture and the personality of its people, from the peasant through the professionals and the nobility.
But Figes has an eye for telling detail. The book spans a half-century, and as the text develops, he follows the lives of ordinary and extraordinary Russians during this time, in little insets within text body. As the major events unfold, we see the lives of individual humans unfold, and their thoughts and feelings evolve.
If I could only read one book on the Russian Revolution, this would be the one.

Rating:
Summary: Good, non-partisan review of the Russian Revolution
Review: The American Civil War,the French Revolution,the Holocaust,and the Russian Revolution will always tempt writers to re-examine them, from a new generation's perspective.

Certainly, idealogues and scholars will never tire of refuting the claims of their opponents, and dismissing attempts at writing a "readable" history of the Russian Revolution as dangerously simplistic.

Figes' post-Cold War era history of the Russian Revolution is a good introduction to the topic. The definative "version" of 20th C Russian history is yet to be written, and it will ultimately be the task of a Russian historian free from the taint of Soviet "historiography" to produce such a work.

BUT.. while waiting... this book is adequate. I believe it is impossible to read a single work on the Russian Revolution and form an objective opinion. However, objectivity is of more concern to the scholar than the lay-reader. Few scholars on this subject care to rise above sectarian arguments, and they share much in common with the irritating obscurantism of the Menshevik/Bolshevik polemicists.

Personally I have always felt that Trotsky's "History of the Russian Revolution" was a readable, if partisan account of the social and economic conditions which led to the Revolution, and that Roy Medvedev's "Let History Judge", was a suitable sequel. Certainly Leninism contained the seeds of Stalinism, if it was not the actual root stock and green-house of Stalinism. Trotsky, although a "hero" of my youth, also lacked " clean hands" after the suppression of the Kronstadt Uprising. It will be worth waiting to see if any definate and readable history of Bukharin waits in the wings.

There are dozens of wretched books sitting in community libraries which purport to tell the story of the Russian revolution. Of the post Cold War writers, this is my favotite.

Figes has an editorial slant, as do all popular historians. He does arrange his narrative in a readable format.. that is, in "digestible hunks". His use of personal narratives sheds light on complex issues,and his development of certain historical characters help move his narrative forward. His far ranging opinions include observations on post-Soviet political life. The photographs chosen for this book are good,and some are quite disturbing. They are well-arranged, to support ideas developed in the text.

Opinions and belief shape our thinking, oft times more than actual facts. I think, that this book is a breath of fresh air. However,if the historical period is of interest to you, keep on breathing, and keep on reading. If this is the ONLY book you read about the Russian Revolution, you will certainly be no more mis-informed than generations of policy makers in the US government OR the Soviet government.

Rating:
Summary: Sound but biased
Review: The book is voluminous and the period of history in focus is densely packed, but Figes's flowing style and keen interest in the matter keep one engaged. Through snapshot descriptions of many personalities that colored the times, the narrative paints as vivid a picture as any one book can. Kerensky, Lenin, Brusilov, Gorky and many others appear as much humans as politicians/generals/intellectuals etc. This especially makes the book memorable. The occasional roughness of style or omission of some facts (for example, the transformation of Gorky, the most often quoted source in the book, from a street urchin and an orphan into an educated and rich man) is more than vindicated by colorful personal and societal portraits and some provocative thoughts.

With the backdrop of Nicholas II living in the patriarchal past and Provisional Government living in the future (ever waiting for the Constitutional Assembly), Bolsheviks emerge as the ones firmly living in the present, pragmatically resolving the conflicts of the moment regardless of ideology. They gave peasants gentry's land and in return, with peasant help, won the civil war. They exited the I World War (at the cost of a third of agricultural land and over a half of industrial enterprises) and infiltrated the soldiers' Soviets and in return had military support in the October coup d'état. They gave non-Russian peoples the right of self-determination believing that this would precipitate communist revolutions there. Of course, all these measures were later reversed. The land remained state's property and smallholding peasants were subjected to collectivization. The people were thrown into the bloody civil war and exposed to terror, starvation and disease (the conservative estimate of 10 million Russian deaths resulting from the October events far superseded Russian losses in the I World War, some 1.7 million dead). And the national territories were taken by force. Among these ever changing policies one was constant: the Bolsheviks' drive for power. Taking power by military force, shooting the Constitutional Assemblymen, taking the last food provisions from peasants at a gun point, putting Cheka, with its 250,000 members only during Lenin's times, (approximately 10 times the last Czar's secret police) above the law: descriptions of these events present Bolsheviks as a military junta more than anything else. They created a society in which the main organizing principle was terror. That, indeed, was the people's tragedy.

Figes devotes a fair bit of space to the social formations beyond Bolsheviks. The Whites, with their unfortunate Czarist image and land property mentality. Peasants, backward and apolitical but crucial, as the Civil War showed. Soldiers, who let themselves degrade to marauding and shooting millions of their own people. Intelligentsia and politicians, many of whom, in a typically Russian way, preferred to haughtily abstain rather than engage.

The book feels much tighter and more coherent than the author's "Natasha's Dance". In addition, appealing is Figes's sensitivity to the precarious historic moments when a very probable different outcome could have radically changed the future (almost reaching for peace in the I World War by the Provisional Government, almost not engaging in the military coup by Bolsheviks etc.).

To summarize, very engaging and definitely worthwhile.

Rating:
Summary: A Stunning Work of Literary Genius!!!
Review: This book is thick but worth reading every last page! I could not put it down there was so many fascinating facts and so many tragedies! The Russian people suffered a terrible fate when they turned to Lenin's Communist Ideology. It proved to be the death of some 60 million people! Russia is still reaping the 'terrors' of Bolshevism/Communism. Most Russian people are fearful, haunted, dejected, and extremely poor. Communism was no god but a losing ideology. It only helped those at the top and even they were hunted, fearful, killed off or put in labor camps. An excellent, information-packed book!

Rating:
Summary: A Great Account of the Revolution
Review: This is about as non-partisan a history that you can find for something as ideologically charged as the Russian revolution. But of course, non-partisan is still not impartial: a truly impartial history is impossible and impossibly boring. What's really wonderful about Orlando Figes' account is the coupling of sober analysis with a more sophisticated partiality. It is also written very well, replete with zesty anecdotes. Now let me explain what I mean by non-partisan but partial.

Traditionally, a given history of the Russian revolution divides into the two obvious camps. The leftist account is especially repugnant because it extricates Lenin from the bloodbath that ensued, which is doubtless an exercise in monstrous duplicity. The rightist view is more factually sound but the incessant pounding of the ... gavel gets in the way of analysis. Their black and white view of history is only too quick to blast and their viewpoint is duplicitous in more senses than one, though to a much lesser extent than the leftist apologists.

I've actually liked the rightist view more because it clearly highlights the ... fruit of Leninism called Stalinism. But I've always wondered how they seemed to think that a revolution could be imposed more or less top-down. Granted, there was the galvanizing force called Lenin, but can one man's willpower really dominate a nation of 100 million+ people speaking diverse languages, largely illiterate, and alienated from the intelligentsia? I'm neither Russian nor a historian, thus, admittedly, my opinion carries little weight. But it seems to me that a revolution of this scale requires more willful participation than willy-nilly coercion at gunpoint, that, say, Paul Johnson would have you believe. (And anyone who is content with "Oh, but after all they're Russians" is perfectly irresponsible.)

Figes addresses this point exactly. The thesis of the book is that the revolution is a bottom-up event and not top-down as has been held popularly. This wonderful excerpt from his epilogue hammers the point home deliciously: "Their [the Russian people's] revolutionary tragedy lay in the legacies of their own cultural backwardness rather than the evil of some `alien' Bolsheviks. They were not the victims of the revolution but protagonists in its tragedy ... It was the weakness of Russia's democratic culture which enabled Bolshevism to take root." (pg.808). This is Figes' partiality on which his account of the revolution is built. And build it he does in the whopping 800 oversized pages.

His bias really shows in these three aspects: (1) in the barbarism of the peasants (2) in the countless descriptions of how the populace either willfully or inadvertently misconstrued Bolshevism and (3) in emphasizing the haphazardness and opportunism of Bolshevist policies.

As for (1), the book aims to show that horrific barbarism was not the sole property of the Bolsheviks, but shared in common with the people. It seems to me that apologists of the peasantry take a Dostoevskian populist view that holds the peasants to be, at bottom, upright people. Figes shows that this was hardly the case: the chapter titled "Icons and Cockroaches" contains a gruesome description of peasant mores (the Jewish pogroms are mentioned later). Here, a household maxim will suffice: "'Hit your wife with the butt of the axe, get down and see if she's breathing. If she is, she's shamming and wants some more'" (pg.97). (If you hold to the view that so-called backward societies are angelic, try Robert Edgerton's "Sick Societies".) On the other hand, Figes is also quick to point out that the Red Terror "was implicit in the regime from the start" (pg. 630). Frequent anecdotes of atrocities and atrocities committed in revenge are persuasive in arguing that brutality at least was equally shared.

As for (2), the rightist's argument is that Reds triumphed because they were more ruthless than the Whites in their application of [creating trouble]. But can you really control an entire regiment at gunpoint and hope to win a war? Figes offers a much more reasonable explanation: the very fact that the Reds could claim to be the champions of the revolution and use powerful symbols like the Red Flag gave it the necessary impetus (pg. 668). Afterall, how can a largely illiterate peasantry understand concepts like `socialism' and `communism'? The vagueness of their political position is very clearly shown, to name one example, in the existence of cults of Kerensky and Lenin. All that the peasants ultimately comprehended were land and security. In the end, the people willfully supported the Reds, because they appeared to uphold the crucial land reform, and were therefore the lesser of two evils.

As for (3), a typical example is his opinion of the origin of War Communism, that "much of it was in fact improvised" (pg. 614). Indeed, it would take an almost superhuman lucidity to plan the whole evolution into a police state from the very inception of Bolshevik rule. Figes' history of the revolution will show that Leninism "progressed" by fits and starts, often accompanied by clamorous disagreement among entrenched elements within the Party. Almost always, the external impetus was none other than the momentum of the Russian people.

I am not able to assess whether the numerous memoranda, documents, etc. cited are authentic enough to be called facts. But there is nothing overtly suspicious that I've found. In which case, the above three points point to Figes' conclusion that the revolution was the handiwork of the Russian population. His bias would then merely be the correct perspective.

Maxim Gorky, a writer who witnessed the revolution firsthand, wrote the following heartless indictment: "I do not believe that in the twentieth century there is such a thing as a `betrayed people'" (pg. 808). This may in fact be the chilling truth.