| |
|
Stalin
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Phoenix (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd ), 2004
Mass Murder
+ Six hundred pages of Solitude.
This is the definitive biography of Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili (Stalin) and his evil dictatorship. From his birth in 1878 through his rise to power in the 1920's, the "Great Terror" of the late 1930's, the conflict of World War II, the horrific post-war period to his death in 1953, Stalin's ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
A PEOPLE'S TRAGEDY: THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION 1891-1924.
Orlando. Figes
Pimlico, 1997
Orando Fige's A People's Tragedy ...
An excellent contemporary account of the Russian Revolution by a respected historian who does an excellent job of integrating new sources and old, and letting us see the effects on the common folk of Russia of both the two revolutions and the ensuing three year civil war. A must read for anyone ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Stalin: A Biography
Robert Service
Belknap Press, 2006
Stalin is Still A Mystery
Service has written a well-researched history of Stalin's life here. It is very thorough and complete and yet it is still quite readable. Unfortunately though, Stalin still remains the cipher that he always has been. No new insight into his lust for power emerges from the six hundred plus pages of ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Main Currents of Marxism: The Founders, The Golden Age, The Breakdown
Leszek Kolakowski
W. W. Norton, 2008
A High Point of Intellectual History
+ A Monumental work
+ Read it and weep!
This is an outstanding description and analysis of the history of Marxism as a philosophic enterprise and doctrine. Kolakowski's goal is a fair and lucid history of Marxism as an intellectual enterprise. This is a highly ambitious undertaking requiring familiarity with a huge range of writers and ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Darkness at Noon: A Novel
Arthur Koestler
Scribner, 2006
Psychological Examination of Stalinist Show Trials
+ Novel of Ideas
+ "1984" in 1938
+ Brilliant, insightful pessimism.
+ An Intriguing Consideration of the Struggle of Man Between Honor and Ideology
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Comrades!: A History of World Communism
Robert Service
Harvard University Press, 2007
An excellent survey
+ Workmanlike
Service has done an excellent job compressing a major topic - the rise and fall of communism - into a single volume. This makes a good starting off point for anyone who wants to learn about the subject. The books is divided up into manageable chapters based largely on geography, making it an easy ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Animal Farm and 1984
George Orwell
Harcourt, 2003
Worthy literature that transcends the genre of political fable
+ Animal Farm + 1984 = Great Edition
+ Best Orwell's edition
+ WORTH READING AGAIN - AND HAVING IN YOUR LIBRARY
+ Boy, this cover is attractive.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Lenin: A Biography
Robert Service
Belknap Press, 2002
Balanced, definitive biography
+ Great Book Whether you love him or hate him.
Like Lenin's life, this book goes through slow, quiet times as well as periods of frenetic activity. Especially interesting are sections on Lenin's childhood and family, the October Revolution itself, and Lenin's final political struggle with Stalin as he battled his failing health. The chapters ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Young Stalin
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Knopf, 2007
Clairfies the character brilliantly.
+ Delightful! Similar to Young Indiana Jones
+ in laconical praise
+ Stalin The Priest
+ The makings of Russia's future master
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Gulag: A History
Anne Applebaum
Anchor, 2004
The more I know about Russia, the happier I am to be American (if only by heart)
+ Encyclopedic in Scope; Doesn't Advocate Nazis=Communists; Needs Corrections
+ Perhaps just some tea
+ An Unparalleled Look at Life and Death in Stalin's Death Camps!
+ The big and the small prison zone
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
The Whisperers: Private Life in Stalin's Russia
Orlando Figes
Metropolitan Books, 2007
Dangerous whispers
+ Brilliant
+ Superb and chilling
+ A moving and important book
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Pol Pot: Anatomy of a Nightmare
Philip Short
Holt Paperbacks, 2006
One Death is a Tragedy; A Million a Statistic
+ Humans as oxen
+ The biography of Brother Number One and Cambodia.
Pol Pot: Anatomy of a Nightmare
Pol Pot: Anatomy of a Nightmare
"The evacuation of Phnom Penh was a shambles. To move more than two and a half million people out of a crowded metropolis at a few hour's notice, with nowhere for them to stay; no medical care; no government transport and little ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Fidel: Hollywood's Favorite Tyrant
Humberto Fontova
Regnery Publishing, Inc., 2005
Hooray for Humberto for having the guts to write this book
+ Not all liberals are stupid
+ Ask a Cuban!
I love this book and cannot wait for Humberto's next book on Che. I find his information very well researched and reflective of his extensive and informed studies in Latin American History in which he has his Masters degree from Tulane University.
I am a first generation American. My mother ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-1956 : An Experiment in Literary Investigation I-II
Aleksandr Isaevich Solzhenitsyn
Harper & Row, 1974
The nail in the coffin of the Soviet State
+ Encyclopedic in Scope. Please Click on Links Below to My Unabridged-Version Reviews
+ A soul-shaking earthquake of a book...
+ The single greatest literary work of the twentieth century.
+ A STYLISTIC ACHIEVEMENT ALSO
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
Exposing the Real Che Guevara: And the Useful Idiots Who Idolize Him
Humberto Fontova
Sentinel HC, 2007
Che and Anderson Exposed!
+ Let's face the thruth
+ Great Book,Actually Truthful and Not Some Bias,Bubbling Book about A Murderer.
If Humberto Fontova's book were not so disturbing, I would call it a page-turner. And in as much as it grips you from the first sentence, it is still difficult to read of the first-hand accounts of such brutalities which, sadly, fill this book from beginning to end. Unlike Jon Lee Anderson's ...
|
|
|
|
|
|
