The authors have collected far-flung documents and woven them into a narrative that focuses on the effort to build communism in Russia and its effects on the lives of ordinary people.--[book cover]
Contents
Prelude to revolution -- A land of contrasts -- Revolutionary politics -- The Revolution of 1905 -- On the eve of war and revolution -- 1917 : the year of revolution -- The radicalization of society -- The Bolshevik rise to power -- Views of the Revolution -- The consolidation of Bolshevik rule, 1918-1921 -- The fate of the royal family -- Opposition and criticism -- The embrace of dictatorship -- Peasant resistance and the crisis of Kronstadt -- The road to socialism -- The transformation of culture and society -- Celebrating revolution -- The debate about NEP -- Stalin's revolution from above, 1928-1932 -- Beating Russia into the 20th century -- The war against the peasantry and church -- The world of five-year plans -- Picture essay: Women's liberation in the Soviet Union -- Soviet society and culture in the 1930s -- The cult of Stalin -- The Stalinist revolution -- The Great Terror -- The Gulag -- Three views of the purges -- The trial of Bukharin -- Literature and the purges -- Epilogue -- Assessments of Stalinism -- Reflection on the Soviet experience -- Timeline.