Russia in Flames: War, Revolution, Civil War, 1914 - 1921

Description

In 1913, the Romanov dynasty celebrated its tercentenary-three centuries of autocratic rule over one of the world's mightiest and most expansive empires. Four years later, the monarchy lay in ruins and a brutal struggle had begun to fill the vacuum of power. The Russian Revolution utterly re-shaped the landscape of the twentieth century. To mark the centennial of this epochal event, distinguished scholar Laura Engelstein offers a full history of not just the February and October Revolutions but the critical period surrounding and giving rise to them, beginning with the outbreak of World War One and following through until the end of the civil strife-seven years of violence and chaos that finally left the Bolsheviks in command of the field. With fresh eyes and narrative verve, backed by a lifetime of scholarly work in the field, Engelstein's account offers new perspectives on the events that led to the fall of the old order and ultimately the creation of the Soviet state, a way of looking at the institutions and structures of power that were simultaneously crumbling and being replaced. In the process she provides a dynamic sense of the play of personalities and agendas that set Russia on a course of self-destruction and reinvention, and on a scale previously unimagined. Russia in Flames will join the ranks of works by Orlando Figes, Simon Sebag Montefiore, Timothy Snyder, and Richard Pipes: a major, defining, exhaustive, and exhilarating account of war and revolution as they were unfolding, and as one of history's greatest empires was dissolving and reforming itself before the eyes of the world.