The Russian Revolution

Granat

Entsiklopedicheskii Slovar’ Tov-va Granat

, 55 vols.

IA

Istoricheskii arkhiv

IM

Istorik Marksist

IR

Illustrirovannaia Rossiia

ISSSR

Istoriia SSSR

IV

Istoricheskii vestnik

IZ

Istoricheskie zapiski

Jahrbücher

Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas

KA

Krasnyi arkhiv

KL

Krasnaia letopis’

KN

Krasnaia nov’

Lenin,

Khronika

V. I. Lenin:

Biograficheskaia Khronika, 1870–1924

, 13 vols.

    (Moscow, 1970–85)

Lenin,

PSS

V. I. Lenin,

Polnoe Sobranie sochinenii

, 5th ed. 55 vols.

    (Moscow, 1958–65)

Lenin,

Sochineniia

V. I. Lenin, Sochineniia

, 3rd ed., 30 vols.

    (Moscow-Leningrad, 1927–33)

LN

Literaturnoe nasledstvo

LS

Leninskii sbornik

MG

Minuvshie gody

NChS

Na chuzhoi storone

ND

Novyi den’

NKh

Narodnoe khoziaistvo

NoV

Novoe vremia

NS

Nashe slovo

NV

Nash vek

NVCh

Novyi vechernyi chas

NZ

Die Neue Zeit

NZh

Novaia zhizn’

OD

L. Martov

et al

, eds.,

Obshchestvennoe dvizhenie v Rossii v

nachale XX veka

, 4 vols. (St. Petersburg, 1910–14)

Padenie

P. E. Shcheglovitov, ed.,

Padenie tsarskogo rezhima

, 7 vols.

    (Leningrad, 1924–27)

PN

Poslednie novosti

PR

Proletarskaia revoliutsiia

PRiP

Proletarskaia revoliutsiia i pravo

Revoliutsiia

N. Avdeev

et al., Revoliutsiia 1917 goda:

    khronika sobytii

, 6 vols. (Moscow, 1923–30)

RL

Russkaia letopis’

RM

Russkaia mysl’

RR

Russian Review

RS

Russkoe slovo

RV

Russkie vedomosti

RZ

Russkie zapiski

SB

Staryi Bol’shevik

SD

Sotsial-Demokrat

SiM

Strana i mir

SR

Slavic Review

SS

Soviet Studies

SUiR

Sobranie uzakonenii i rasporiazhenii

SV

Sotsialisticheskii vestnik

SZ

Sovremennye zapiski

VCh

Vechernyi chas

VE

Vestnik Evropy

VI

Voprosy istorii

VIKPSS

Voprosy istorii KPSS

VO

Vechernye ogni

VS

Vlast’ sovetov

VZ

Vierteljahreshefte für Zeitgeschichte

VZh

Vestnik zhizni

ZhS

Zhivoe slovo

INTRODUCTION

This book is the first attempt in any language to present a comprehensive view of the Russian Revolution, arguably the most important event of the century. There is no shortage of surveys of the subject, but they concentrate on the political and military struggles for power over Russia between 1917 and 1920. Seen from the perspective of time, however, the Russian Revolution was a great deal more than a contest for power in one country: what the victors in that contest had in mind was defined by one of its leading protagonists, Leon Trotsky, as no less than “overturning the world.” By that was meant a complete redesign of state, society, economy, and culture all over the world for the ultimate purpose of creating a new human being.

These far-reaching implications of the Russian Revolution were not evident in 1917–18, in part because the West considered Russia to lie on the periphery of the civilized world and in part because the Revolution there occurred in the midst of a World War of unprecedented destructiveness. In 1917–18 it was believed by virtually all non-Russians that what had occurred in Russia was of exclusively local importance, irrelevant to them and in any event bound to settle down once peace had been restored. It turned out otherwise. The repercussions of the Russian Revolution would be felt in every corner of the globe for the rest of the century.