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Russia in Revolution
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Opening with a panorama of Russian society, from the cloistered world of the Tsar to the brutal life of the peasants, A People’s Tragedy follows workers, soldiers, intellectuals and villagers as their world is consumed by revolution and then degenerates into violence and dictatorship. Drawing on vast original research, Figes conveys above all the shocking experience of the revolution for those who lived it, while providing the clearest and most cogent account of how and why it unfolded.
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 64
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 58
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The terrible conflict that dominated the mid-19th century, the Crimean War, killed at least 800,000 men and pitted Russia against a formidable coalition of Britain, France and the Ottoman Empire. It was a war for territory, provoked by fear that if the Ottoman Empire were to collapse then Russia could control a huge swathe of land from the Balkans to the Persian Gulf. But it was also a war of religion, driven by a fervent, populist and ever more ferocious belief by the Tsar and his ministers that it was Russia's task to rule all Orthodox Christians and control the Holy Land.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The Fall of Carthage
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- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 16 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 4
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 3
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Story5 out of 5 stars 3
The struggle between Rome and Carthage in the Punic Wars was arguably the greatest and most desperate conflict of antiquity. The forces involved and the casualties suffered by both sides were far greater than in any wars fought before the modern era, while the eventual outcome had far-reaching consequences for the history of the Western World, namely the ascendancy of Rome. An epic of war and battle, this is also the story of famous generals and leaders: Hannibal, Fabius Maximus, Scipio Africanus, and his grandson Scipio Aemilianus, who would finally bring down the walls of Carthage.
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 3
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Beginning in the 18th century with the building of St. Petersburg - a 'window on the West' - and culminating with the challenges posed to Russian identity by the Soviet regime, Figes examines how writers, artists, and musicians grappled with the idea of Russia itself - its character, spiritual essence and destiny. He skillfully interweaves the great works - by Dostoevsky, Stravinsky, and Chagall - with folk embroidery, peasant songs, religious icons and all the customs of daily life, from food and drink to bathing habits to beliefs about the spirit world.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 13
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 13
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Drawing on a huge range of sources - letters, memoirs, conversations - Orlando Figes tells the story of how Russians tried to endure life under Stalin. Those who shaped the political system became, very frequently, its victims. Those who were its victims were frequently quite blameless. The Whisperers recreates the sort of maze in which Russians found themselves, where an unwitting wrong turn could either destroy a family or, perversely, later save it: a society in which everyone spoke in whispers - whether to protect themselves, their families, neighbours or friends - or to inform on them.
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A Real Life Dystopian Nightmare
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In this landmark work that will forever change your understanding of how and why America went to war in Vietnam, author Fredrik Logevall taps newly accessible diplomatic archives in several nations and traces the path that led two Western nations to tragically lose their way in the jungles of Southeast Asia. He brings to life the bloodiest battles of France’s final years in Indochina - and describes how, from an early point, a succession of American leaders made disastrous policy choices that put America on its own collision course with history.
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When Britain launched its first war on China in 1839, pushed into hostilities by profiteering drug merchants and free-trade interests, it sealed the fate of what had long been seen as the most prosperous and powerful empire in Asia, if not the world. But internal problems of corruption, popular unrest, and dwindling finances had weakened China far more than was commonly understood, and the war would help set in motion the eventual fall of the Qing dynasty - which, in turn, would lead to the rise of nationalism and communism in the 20th century.
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The window between two equally stifling autocracies - the imperial family and the communists - was open only briefly, in the last couple of years of the 19th century until the end of WWI, by which time the revolution was in full fury. From the last years of Tolstoy until the death of the Tsar and his family, however, Russia experimented with liberalism and cultural openness. Novelists and playwrights blossomed and political ideas were swapped in coffee houses.
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At the approach of the first millennium, the Christians of Europe did not seem likely candidates for future greatness. They saw no future beyond the widely anticipated Second Coming of Christ. But when the world did not end, the peoples of Western Europe suddenly found themselves with no choice but to begin the heroic task of building a Jerusalem on Earth. In The Forge of Christendom, Tom Holland masterfully describes this remarkable new age, a time of caliphs and Viking sea kings, the spread of castles, and the invention of knighthood.
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The transcontinental railroads of the late 19th century were the first corporate behemoths. Their attempts to generate profits from proliferating debt sparked devastating panics in the US economy. Their dependence on public largess drew them into the corridors of power, initiating new forms of corruption. Their operations rearranged space and time, and remade the landscape of the West. As wheel and rail, car and coal, they opened new worlds of work and ways of life.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great Way to Tell the History
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Hitler
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This masterful biography by one of Germany’s best known journalists was the leading nonfiction best seller in Germany. Fest shows Hitler as the receptacle of the dreads and resentments of a shaken social order, gifted with an uncanny instinct for all that was hollow behind the appearance of power, at home and abroad. Though a warped human being, he was neither clown nor puppet, as many liked to think; Hitler appears here as an enormously astute politician, impressing and hypnotizing Germans and foreigners alike with the scope of his projects and the theatricality of their presentation. Fest uncovers in Hitler a constantly destructive personality....
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Lenin
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- By: Victor Sebestyen
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 197
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 180
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Drawing on new research, including the diaries, memoirs, and personal letters of both Lenin and his friends, Victor Sebestyen's unique biography - the first in English in nearly two decades - is not only a political examination of one of the most important historical figures of the 20th century but a portrait of Lenin the man. Unexpectedly, Lenin was someone who loved nature, hunting, and fishing and could identify hundreds of species of plants, a despotic ruler whose closest ties and friendships were with women.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The Wrong Faction Won
- By Jim on 01-04-18
Publisher's Summary
The Russian Revolution of 1917 transformed the face of the Russian empire, politically, economically, socially, and culturally and also profoundly affected the course of world history for the rest of the 20th century. Historian S. A. Smith presents a panoramic account of the history of the Russian empire, from the last years of the 19th century, through the First World War and the revolutions of 1917 and the establishment of the Bolshevik regime, to the end of the 1920s, when Stalin simultaneously unleashed violent collectivization of agriculture and crash industrialization upon Russian society.
Drawing on recent archivally based scholarship, Russia in Revolution pays particular attention to the varying impact of the Revolution on the various groups that made up society: peasants, workers, non-Russian nationalities, the army, women and the family, young people, and the church. In doing so, it provides a fresh way into the big, perennial questions about the Revolution and its consequences: Why did the attempt by the tsarist government to implement political reform after the 1905 Revolution fail? Why did the First World War bring about the collapse of the tsarist system? Why did the attempt to create a democratic system after the February Revolution of 1917 not get off the ground? Why did the Bolsheviks succeed in seizing and holding on to power? Why did they come out victorious from a punishing civil war? Why did the New Economic Policy they introduced in 1921 fail? And why did Stalin come out on top in the power struggle inside the Bolshevik party after Lenin's death in 1924?
A final chapter then reflects on the larger significance of 1917 for the history of the 20th century - and, for all its terrible flaws, what the promise of the Revolution might mean for us today.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
- bballdave025
- 09-13-18
Excellent centenary look at the complete revolutio
This book was great as a balanced look at the events of the Russian revolution, including a part that many books miss - the Civil War and the NEP.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- Kyrre
- 09-16-18
Interesting but way too long
From a political scientists’ point of view, I find it very interesting that the author puts so mich focus into non-political causes and conditions surrounding the revolution. Yet, still, a big minus is that the author includes way, way, way too many unnecessary details - to the extent that I think the book could have been half as long, and still made the same point. There is simply top much “noise” in that respect. At the same time, the author sometimes makes statements that appear to be stated facts, even as they are still very much up for discussion. Whether Lenin received payments from the German government in 1917 is one such example. It is not a bad book. It’s just not... very good either.