A People’s Tragedy

By: Orlando Figes

Narrated by: Roger Davis

Opening with a panorama of Russian society, from the cloistered world of the Tsar to the brutal life of the peasants, A People’s Tragedy follows workers, soldiers, intellectuals and villagers as their world is consumed by revolution and then degenerates into violence and dictatorship.

Drawing on vast original research, Figes conveys above all the shocking experience of the revolution for those who lived it, while providing the clearest and most cogent account of how and why it unfolded.

Now including a new introduction that reflects on the revolution’s centennial legacy, A People’s Tragedy is a masterful and definitive record of one of the most important events in modern history.

©2018 Orlando Figes (P)2018 Audible, Ltd

A Great Story

Gripping and well told, this is the story of how Bolshevism came to win out in Russia. The writing and narration are both superb.

Excellent History of Russian Revolution

This is the second Figes book I’ve listened to and it was another excellent one. I didn’t like the narrator so much.

The three Russian Revolutions

Orlando Figes has given us an excellent history of The Russian Revolution and, to give the necessary background to explain what happened and why, starts this book by looking at the state of both Russia and the Russian people in the years leading up to the start of the 20th century. The background information is so thorough that it takes up almost 1/3 of the book and is, by itself, almost worth the cost of the book The remainder of the book covers the Menshevik and Bolshevik revolutions, the resulting civil war, The Terror unleashed by the Bolsheviks against first The Bourgeoisie and then against The Peasants and ends with the death of Lenin.

I bought this book because I wanted to know more about why the Russian Revolution happened, how and why the Bolsheviks managed to grab and hold power from the democratic revolution of early 1917 and how and why the Whites lost the resulting civil war, but learned as well how little I actually knew of Russia before the revolution, how poor the peasants were, how little experience Russians had with democratic institutions, how blind the Monarchy and Nobility were in understanding what was happening and how close Lenin and the Bolsheviks came to failing. I started this book understanding very little of what happened and why, and finished knowing a great deal more about the causes of the revolution and why all of the counter-revolutionary movements failed, even though the people were sick of the tyranny of the Bolsheviks.

The book, at 48 hours, is long but never boring. The history and politics of what was happening is clearly explained, the roles of those involved are clear and the failures of many of those involved are clearly related to their unwillingness to see what was happening rather than see what they wanted to see. The book is not kind to the Bolsheviks and it is clear from his speeches and letters that Lenin himself was the main reason that the revolution turned from its democratic beginnings and became the tyranny that caused the deaths of thousands in The Terror and of millions in the great famine, as well as the beginnings of the police state. Prior to reading this book I was familiar with many of the names of those in the Bolshevik movement - Trotsky, Zinoviev, Bukharin, Kamenev and others - but could not have explained precisely what they believed and how their views differed from each other, from Lenin and from Stalin, but all of that is also covered in this book.

Parts of the book are difficult to listen to, particularly those involving the famine and the forcible requisitioning of food and grain from the farmers. Those people become real in the telling rather than just the statistic they used to be for me, and the tragedy, made by the Bolshevik leaders, is painful to read about with only the saving grace of the relief effort made by the United States to feed those who were starving and provide grain for future harvests. In addition the wide-spread torture used by both the Reds and Whites as well as the pogroms against the Jews are covered and are painful to listen to.

The narration is excellent, the material is well organized and makes a history of what happened and why it happened easy to understand. The book also explains how Stalin gathered his power and became head of the Soviet government after the death of Lenin in spite of Lenin’s attempt to prevent his rise to power,

Highly recommended for anyone interested in this period of history.

Easily one of the top 100 books in History ... maybe one of the top 100 books in all topics

An absolute necessity for anyone with a moderately serious interest in History ... Important not only for the topic itself and the Bolshevik Revolution deserves more serious studies of this caliber but this books is also important as an example of the method or architecture of the solid and consequential approach in telling the story behind the event. You might not like this event, but you should have this work on your [audio] bookshelf.

Excellent

A thorough and well written narrative of the Russian revolution. Brilliantly captures the experiences and suffering of the those who lived through it and highlights well its tragic outcomes.

excellent and not dry

this is a difficult subject to write about. the probability that the story will be dry and difficult to listen to is huge, but this book overcomes that.

Narration sometimes sounds arrogant and all-knowing rather than compassionate

Figes represents the story of Russian tragedy in a one-sided way, emphasizing everyone faults and not expounding on talents of ruling elite and Bolshevik leaders.

Exhaustively Researched and Well Written

This is an excellent and thorough analysis of the causes and course of the Russian
Revolution, or perhaps I should say revolutions. The book is exhaustively researched,
well written and cogently argued.
Figes starts with the background of Russian society, from the centuries of poverty and
isolation of the peasants to the blindness of the Romanovs both to the sufferings of the
Russian people and to the social and political developments of the West and of Japan.
The book traces the many decades of failed reform efforts, the inabilities of reformers to
connect with the peasants, the social isolation of the urban intelligentsia and the popular
frustration and anger resulting from the failed reforms and the intractability of the tsars,
the aristocracy and the church.
Figes shows how the mobilization and industrialization of WWI gave the socialists
access to organized groups of workers, soldiers and sailors, and how the losses,
privations and general hopelessness resulting from the war galvanized the frustration
and anger of the populace to bring down the tsar. Given the lack of any tradition of self-
government beyond the local peasant commune, however, there was no societal
commitment to a democratic government and thus no viable successor to the tsarist
state.
Most of the socialists were tied to doctrinaire Marxism and believed that a bourgeois
society had to be created before socialism could take hold. Their efforts to this end, in
the interim government, further alienated both workers and peasants. Figes shows how
the Bolsheviks were able to capitalize on popular frustration with the slow pace of the
liberals’ reforms, and the anger with continued involvement in WWI, to quash all the
reform efforts and seize power. He shows how the Bolsheviks then betrayed, and
subverted the work of, the local soviets, peasant communes, workers’ committees and
soldiers’ committees, all of which had helped to bring down the tsar, in order to
consolidate their power. Figes also illustrates Lenin’s megalomania and unwillingness
to tolerate any true collaboration, leading to a new autocracy, police state, terror, famine
and eventually Stalinism.
The book discusses how the new Bolshevik totalitarianism mirrored so many aspects of
the old autocracy, from its use of terror to the prevalence of privilege and corruption.
The main difference between the two regimes was that the new masters came from the
same social class as those they ruled. This made it easier for the workers and
peasants to sympathize with, or perhaps tolerate, the Bolsheviks in the civil war, rather
than the Whites.
The foreword to the latest edition discusses the lasting effects of the Revolution and
paints a depressing picture of Russia under Putin.

Beautiful, detailed, long

As most of figes books, it is incredibly detailed. In this instance, maybe a little too much so.

Extraordinary

Totally worth the time. An extraordinary presentation. The narrator does a first class job. Read, ahem listen to it!!!