Michael Khodarkovsky's innovative exploration of Russia's 20th century, through 100 carefully selected vignettes that span the century, offers a fascinating prism through which to view Russian history. Each chosen microhistory focuses on one particular event or individual that allows you to understand Russia not in abstract terms but in real events in the lives of ordinary people. Russia's 20th Century covers a broad range of topics, including the economy, culture, politics, ideology, law and society. This introduction provides a vital background and engaging analysis of Russia's path through a turbulent 20th century.
A representative sample of chapters in the book includes:
1902: Peasants
1903: The Pogrom
1906: The Tsar's Speech
1908: Church
1910: Tolstoy's Death
1913: The Romanovs
1916: Rasputin
1922: USSR
1927: Orphans into Communists
1931: Palace of the Soviets
1935: Manufacturing Heroes
1939: Hitler's Ally
1941: Moscow on the Brink
1945: Rape of Germany
1949: Atomic Project
1954: Nuclear War Exercise "Snowball"
1955: Empire of Nations
1960: Virgin Lands
1969: The Soviet Dr. Seuss
1971: The Soviet Bob Dylan
1972: Nixon in Moscow and Kiev
1977: USSR, Less than a Sum of its Parts
1980: Moscow Olympic Games
1984: "Iron Maiden" Behind the Iron Curtain
1985: Vodka
1990: Soviet Nationalisms and Ethnic Wars
1997: Russian Fascism
1998: Return of the KGB
The historical mosaic of Russia's 20th Century provides a unique examination of modern Russian history one snapshot at a time, prompting us to reflect on a larger picture of Russia's past and its place in the world today.
Michael Khodarkovsky weaves together 100 short vignettes based on episodes in Russia's political, social, cultural and intellectual life, from the Romanovs to President Putin. The result is a book of great originality-a truly panoramic expedition across the turbulent landscape that was Russia's 20th century. Khodarkovsky writes with a conciseness that sacrifices neither learned insight nor analytical sophistication, and readers used to the ponderous detail of much of today's historiography will be refreshed by his text's brevity and eclecticism.
