Status
Available
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Collection
Publication
Vintage (1967), Paperback, 661 pages
Description
Firmly established as the standard Stalin biography, Deutscher's volume clearly demonstrates the forces that shaped this leader and the political scene of his time.
User reviews
LibraryThing member fyi715
Good read. For someone that had no real knowledge of Stalin before reading the book I found this book to be very imformative. Having had the opportunity to visit Russia it is easy to see the lasting effects that Stalin has left with present-day Russia. Extremely polarizing figure.
LibraryThing member charlie68
I was hoping to get more personal information about Stalin. Maybe I didn't realize the definition of political biography would necessarily leave out his personal life. But still a fascinating read of this giant of Soviet History. I'm glad I never lived in the country while he was leader.
LibraryThing member the.ken.petersen
Mr Deutscher makes it clear in his forward to this book that he is no acolyte of Stalin. He also promises not to make the work a destruction of all for which Stalin stood.
I think that he makes an excellent job of this. I have a far greater understanding of the man and the leader than I did before
It is not just Stalin, Lenin before him, had been in favour of rule by the proletariat but, being unable to accept that anyone but himself knew what the people wanted. It is a strange irony that a revolution which was genuinely for the people, almost before its activation, began to pare the acceptable voices to whom it was willing to listen. It was Lenin that threw out the Social Democrats and the Mensheviks. Stalin continued to shave the unacceptable members until, there was only himself. In his final years, he purged and re-purged his leadership until no one was safe.
Deutscher could have made this a real hatchet job. He does not so do: he explains how this came about - if Stalin had not pushed the country to the brink of despair, he wouldn't have been able to grow its industrial base at such speed and it is likely that Hitler may have been successful in the Second World War. That Russia was cast aside by the West afterwards was cruel beyond measure. Stalin was left with little choice but to return to a series of punishing five year plans to rebuild the broken country. His distrust of the West, whilst understandable, lead to his putting military strength too far ahead of comfort for the people.
From being the hero of WW II, he rapidly degenerated to a sad, fearsome dictator.
I think that he makes an excellent job of this. I have a far greater understanding of the man and the leader than I did before
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hand. Stalin was an administrator, not a political mentor. He clung to Lenin's works as his guiding star but, practicality meant that he veered further and further from Marxist-Leninist theory. It is not just Stalin, Lenin before him, had been in favour of rule by the proletariat but, being unable to accept that anyone but himself knew what the people wanted. It is a strange irony that a revolution which was genuinely for the people, almost before its activation, began to pare the acceptable voices to whom it was willing to listen. It was Lenin that threw out the Social Democrats and the Mensheviks. Stalin continued to shave the unacceptable members until, there was only himself. In his final years, he purged and re-purged his leadership until no one was safe.
Deutscher could have made this a real hatchet job. He does not so do: he explains how this came about - if Stalin had not pushed the country to the brink of despair, he wouldn't have been able to grow its industrial base at such speed and it is likely that Hitler may have been successful in the Second World War. That Russia was cast aside by the West afterwards was cruel beyond measure. Stalin was left with little choice but to return to a series of punishing five year plans to rebuild the broken country. His distrust of the West, whilst understandable, lead to his putting military strength too far ahead of comfort for the people.
From being the hero of WW II, he rapidly degenerated to a sad, fearsome dictator.
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Subjects
Awards
Notable Books List (1949)
Language
ISBN
none