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Our Revolution Essays on Working-Class and International Revolution, 1904-1917 By: Leon Davidovich Trotzky (1879-1940) |
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Essays on Working Class and International Revolution, 1904 1917 BY
LEON TROTZKY
Collected and Translated, with Biography and Explanatory Notes BY
MOISSAYE J. OLGIN
Author of "The Soul of the Russian Revolution"
[Illustration]
NEW YORK
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
1918
COPYRIGHT, 1918,
BY
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
Published March, 1918
PREFACE
The world has not known us Russian revolutionists. The world has
sympathized with us; the world abroad has given aid and comfort to our
refugees; the world, at times, even admired us; yet the world has not
known us. Friends of freedom in Europe and America were keenly anxious
to see the victory of our cause; they watched our successes and our
defeats with breathless interest; yet they were concerned with material
results. Our views, our party affiliations, our factional divisions, our
theoretical gropings, our ideological constructions, to us the leading
lights in our revolutionary struggles, were foreign to the world. All
this was supposed to be an internal Russian affair. The Revolution has now ceased to be an internal Russian affair. It has
become of world wide import. It has started to influence governments and
peoples. What was not long ago a theoretical dispute between two
"underground" revolutionary circles, has grown into a concrete
historical power determining the fate of nations. What was the
individual conception of individual revolutionary leaders is now ruling
millions. The world is now vitally interested in understanding Russia, in learning
the history of our Revolution which is the history of the great Russian
nation for the last fifty years. This involves, however, knowing not
only events, but also the development of thoughts, of aims, of ideas
that underlie and direct events; gaining an insight into the immense
volume of intellectual work which recent decades have accumulated in
revolutionary Russia. We have selected Leon Trotzky's contribution to revolutionary thought,
not because he is now in the limelight of history, but because his
conceptions represent a very definite, a clear cut and intrinsically
consistent trend of revolutionary thought, quite apart from that of
other leaders. We do not agree with many of Trotzky's ideas and
policies, yet we cannot overlook the fact that these ideas have become
predominant in the present phase of the Russian Revolution and that they
are bound to give their stamp to Russian democracy in the years to come,
whether the present government remains in power or not. The reader will see that Trotzky's views as applied in Bolsheviki ruled
Russia are not of recent origin. They were formed in the course of the
First Russian Revolution of 1905, in which Trotzky was one of the
leaders. They were developed and strengthened in the following years of
reaction, when many a progressive group went to seek compromises with
the absolutist forces. They became particularly firm through the world
war and the circumstances that led to the establishment of a republican
order in Russia. Perhaps many a grievous misunderstanding and
misinterpretation would have been avoided had thinking America known
that those conceptions of Trotzky were not created on the spur of the
moment, but were the result of a life long work in the service of the
Revolution. Trotzky's writings, besides their theoretical and political value,
represent a vigor of style and a clarity of expression unique in Russian
revolutionary literature. M.J. OLGIN. New York, February 16th, 1918.
CONTENTS
PAGE Biographical Notes 3 The Proletariat and the Revolution 23 The Events in Petersburg 47 Prospects of a Labor Dictatorship 63 The Soviet and the Revolution 147 Preface to My Round Trip 163 The Lessons of the Great Year 169 On the Eve of a Revolution 179 Two Faces 187 The Growing Conflict 199 War or Peace? 205 Trotzky on the Platform in Petrograd 213
LEON TROTZKY BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
Trotzky is a man of about forty... Continue reading book >>
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