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The Russian Revolution: A New History
	Book cover
Author	Sean McMeekin
Audio read by	Pete Larkin
Language	English
Subject	Russian Revolution, Russian Civil War
Genre	Non-fiction, History
Published	2017
Publisher	Basic Books, Hachette Book Group
Publication place	United States
Media type	Hardcover, Paperback, Kindle, Audiobook
Pages	496pp. (Hardcover); 15 hours and 3 minutes (Audiobook)
ISBN	978-0465039906
Website	Book Website at Basic Books

The Russian Revolution: A New History is a political history of the Russian Revolution written by Sean McMeekin and published by Basic Books in 2017. The release was timed with the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution.^[1]

Synopsis

The Russian Revolution explores the period roughly between 1904 – 1921, however it is heavily weighted towards the years immediately leading up to 1917, and the February and October Revolutions. The author provides an overview of early 20th century Russia and factors leading to the Revolution, from the brutal reality of Nicolas II's regime to the aftermath of the Bolshevik revolution and the origins of the Soviet Union in civil war.^[2]

The work is divided into four parts of unequal length: background, the period leading up to the 1917 revolution, the revolutionary events of 1917, and a short section on the aftermath; the body is bracketed with a prologue and epilogue where the author's perspective, goals and conclusions are presented. McMeekin focuses on the Bolsheviks, their leadership, and the actions and accidents which led them into power.

McMeekin devotes considerable attention to the three sided relationship between the Tsar, the conscript army, and the Russian people; he explores the weaknesses of the autocracy in the absence of intermediary institutions between them which would normally manage the relationship and temper reactions. This is seen as especially important in the context of popular discontent in Russia regarding World War I and the mutinous state of the Russian army by 1917. A second and complimentary area the author devotes considerable space to is the relationship between Lenin and Germany and the possible ways Germany may have used Lenin and the Bolsheviks to influence the Russian army and people to disrupt the Russian war effort and its relationship with the Entente powers.^[3]^[4]^[2]^[5] This gives the work an international perspective, looking beyond national borders and imperial boundaries and fitting the subject into the wider scope of events at the beginning of the twentieth century.^[6]

The failed Bolshevik coup during July 1917 and the provisional government's failure to effectively respond to the coup and its leaders is discussed as a key development in the slow motion collapse of the provisional government. McMeekin develops a case that nothing inevitable about the outcome of these years; the Bolshevik revolution, one of the key events in modern history, was carried out by incompetents and was largely the result of chance aided by luck and a hostile foreign power.^[3]^[1]^[7]

Perspective

Writing for the Christian Science Monitor, Terry Hartle writes about McMeekin's focus on individuals, "Historians often debate whether individuals make history or history makes individuals. In the case of the Russian Revolution and the emergence of the Soviet Union, it's clear that what individuals did, or did not do, at crucial times decisively shaped the outcome."^[3]

McMeekin’s views about communism are plain to see in the work, and are similar to the viewpoints held by authors such as Richard Pipes and Orlando Figes.^[1]^[8]^[5] Discussing the portrait that emerges of the Bolsheviks and their leaders in the book, Michael Grove writes in their review for the London Times, "The Russian Revolution was the most successful criminal conspiracy in history. The takeover of an entire nation by a shameless huckster supported by a hostile foreign power. And the revolution was also an object lesson in how liberals can lose, and lose catastrophically, from a position of great advantage, if they are divided in the face of a ruthlessly ideological foe."^[9]^[10]

The author concludes the work with an epilogue, containing a summary of their conclusions and how the events of the Russian Revolution at the beginning of the 20th century speak to events at the beginning of the 21st. McMeekin writes,

"Like the nuclear weapons born of the ideological age inaugurated in 1917, the sad fact about Leninism is that, once invented, it cannot be uninvented. Social inequality will always be with us, along with the well-intentioned impulse of socialists to eradicate it. Fortunately, most social reformers accept limitations on the power of government to direct economic life and tell people what they are permitted to do and say. But the Leninist inclination is always lurking among the ambitious and ruthless, especially in desperate times of depression or war that seem to call for more radical solutions."^[a]
"...the popularity of Marxist-style maximalist socialism is on the rise again in the United States and other Western ‘capitalist’ countries".^[b]

Reception

"Sean McMeekin is a gifted writer with historical talents equal to the challenge of helping the reader to follow the events of the revolution and appreciate their terrible significance. Which is just as well, given how tangled the tale he has to tell."^[9]

"... a carefully researched, well-written assessment of the complex and confusing events that did so much to shape the last century. McMeekin is a reliable guide to a complex story and the book moves seamlessly and clearly across a vast landscape of people and events."^[3]

"The question remains: Why did this anti-human regime come to control Russia and later dominate the world’s Communist sphere? The author does not give a definite answer, but the book helps the reader think and further investigate the history of the Russian Revolution."^[8]

Release information

Hardcover: 2017 (First Edition), Basic Books, 496pp. ISBN 978-0465039906.
Paperback: 2021 (First Edition), Basic Books, 496pp. ISBN 978-1541675483.
Audiobook: 2017, Narrated by Pete Larkin, Hachette Audio, 15 hours and 3 mins.

About the author

Sean McMeekin (born May 10, 1974) is an American historian, focused on European history of the early 20th century. His main research interests include modern German history, Russian history, communism, and the origins of the First and Second World Wars and the roles of Russia and the Ottoman Empire.

Similar or related works

References

Notes

^ Passage quoted from The Russian Revolution: A New History, pp.351.^[11]
^ Passage quoted from The Russian Revolution: A New History, quote pp.352, broader passage pp.347-352, see also pp.219, 274.^[12]

Citations

^ ^a ^b ^c Feifer 2017.
^ ^a ^b Hawes 2017.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Hartle 2017.
^ Dougherty 2018.
^ ^a ^b Roberts 2017.
^ Lambe 2020.
^ Thompson 2018, p. 171a:"E. H. Carr’s celebrated What is History? of 1961 refers to ‘the ‘‘might-havebeen’’ school of thought – or rather of emotion ... Suppose ... that Stolypin had had time to complete his agrarian reform, or that Russia had not gone to war...’ McMeekin’s 352 pages of text are an extended essay along such self-acknowledged lines and are praised in the same terms in one of the encomia on the dust-jacket. For according to McMeekin, ‘The events of 1917 were filled with might-have-beens and missed chances’ (345)." from The Russian Revolution, pp.345.
^ ^a ^b Stanchev 2017.
^ ^a ^b Gove 2017.
^ Thompson 2018, p. 171b:"The influence of What is History? is also explicit in the idea that every historian writes from a particular perspective."
^ Heath 2018.
^ Orlovsky 2017.