Stalin : a biography / Robert Service.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Service, Robert, 1947-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Stalin, Joseph, 1879-1953.

Heads of state--Soviet Union--Biography.

Heads of state.

Soviet Union.

Soviet Union--History--1925-1953.

History.

Stalin, Joseph, 1878-1953.

Stalin, Joseph.

Genre:

Biographies.

Physical Description:

xviii, 715 pages, 24 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. : Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2005.

Summary:

"Overthrowing the conventional image of Stalin as an uneducated political administrator inexplicably transformed into a pathological killer, Robert Service reveals a more complex and fascinating story behind this notorious twentieth-century figure. Drawing on unexplored archives and personal testimonies gathered from across Russia and Georgia, this is the first full-scale biography of the Soviet dictator in twenty years." "Service describes in unprecedented detail the first half of Stalin's life - his childhood in Georgia as the son of a violent, drunkard father and a devoted mother; his education and religious training; and his political activity as a young revolutionary. No mere messenger for Lenin, Stalin was a prominent activist long before the Russian Revolution. Equally compelling is the depiction of Stalin as Soviet leader. Service recasts the image of Stalin as unimpeded despot; his control was not limitless. And his conviction that enemies surrounded him was not entirely unfounded." "Stalin was not just a vengeful dictator but also a man fascinated by ideas and a voracious reader of Marxist doctrine and Russian and Georgian literature as well as an internationalist committed to seeing Russia assume a powerful role on the world stage. In examining the multidimensional legacy of Stalin, Service helps explain why later would-be reformers - such as Khrushchev and Gorbachev - found the Stalinist legacy surprisingly hard to dislodge."--Jacket.

Contents:

pt. 1. The revolutionary.

Stalin as we have known him

The family Dzhughashvili

The schooling of a priest

Poet and rebel

Marxist militant

The party and the Caucasus

On the run

At the centre of the party

Koba and Bolshevism

Osip of Siberia

Return to Petrograd

pt. 2. Leader for the party.

The year 1917

October

People's Commissar

To the front!

The Polish corridor

With Lenin

Nation and revolution

Testament

The opportunities of struggle

Joseph and Nadya

Factionalist against factions

pt. 3. Despot.

Ending the NEP

Terror-economics

Ascent to supremacy

The death of Nadya

Modernity's sorcerer

Fears in victory

Ruling the nations

Mind of terror

The great terrorist

The cult of impersonality

Brutal reprieve

pt. 4. Warlord.

The world in sight

Approaches to war

The devils SUP

Barbarossa

Fighting on

Sleeping on the divan

To the death!

Supreme commander

The big three

Last campaigns

Victory!

pt. 5. The imperator.

Delivering the blow

The outbreak of the Cold War

Subjugating Eastern Europe

Stalinist rulership

Policies and purges

Emperor worship

Dangerous liaisons

Vozhd and intellectual

Ailing despot

Death and embalming

After Stalin.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [661]-680) and index.

Local Notes:

Athenaeum copy: Miller Fund bookplate.

ISBN:

0674016971

OCLC:

57001809