Anotace
The course offers an in-depth reading of two books each of which treats the Bolshevik Revolution differently. Sheila Fitzpatrick provides a condensed overview of basic events between the February Revolution of 1917 and the Great Purges of 1937-38.
She focuses on the revolution as a project of modernization which was carried out by the party. Yuri Slezkine focuses not on the events but rather on the actors – their background, experiences, ideas.
He places Bolshevism squarely in the context of Russia’s fin de siècle in which chiliastic hopes went hand in hand with the readiness for direct action. Rather than as a political project, he presents Bolshevism as a millenarian movement.