The web has numerous sites to Lenin and Trotsky, however most are either over sycophantic or of limited academic interest.  Those offered below are of greater value. What is missing are sites with critical analysis.

 

Biographies

• VI Lenin from the Time 100 series. By David Remnick
• Lenin brief bio from the BBC
• Vladimir Lenin Interesting modern Russian bio from the Russian international TV news channel RT Russia, of the founder and the guiding spirit of the Soviet Republics - a communist philosopher, ardent disciple of Karl Marx, leader of the Bolshevik Party and the mastermind of the 1917 October Revolution.
• A chronology of Lenin Neat and useful from the Lenin Internet Archive but the red background makes use difficult!
• Early Life: Lenin Web. § Many articles of its own on specific periods of Lenin's life before 1917 especially. These links are courtesy of the archived Wayback Machine as the original site is now. Essays have a left wing bias and authors not provided with provenance, but useful for basic events: 
  • Ulyanov's family and youth:
    • The household of the Ulyanov's | The Ulyanov Family | The Childhood of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov | Schooldays in Simbirsk | The Samara Period
  • St. Petersburg - the beginning of revolutionary activity
    • Alexander Ulyanov Trial | The St. Petersburg Underground | The Conspirator | Lenin’s Underground Group 
  • Arrest, exile, revolutionary activity
    • Exile | The West  | The year 1905
• Vladimir Lenin By Henry M. Christman from Essential Works of Lenin. detailed bio  §
• Biography of Lenin (written by Lunacharsky in 1918)
• N. K. Krupskaya's  Reminiscences of Lenin written by Lenin's wife in 1933 and published in 1970. Very full. This is all the book: use the chapters for guidance
• Photographs of Lenin Well set out. Visual biography...
• Examples of  Socialist Realism: Lenin painted Lenins .....  §

Lenin's women

• Troika and terror (Vladimir Illyich Lenin's love life as basis for play by David Pinner) The playwright on Lenin's extraordinary love life.
• The Guardian: Lenin's lieutenant  Article on the role of Inessa Armand
• Inessa Armand and Nadezhda Krupskaya wife and mistress from Spartacus site

 

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2. Lenin: Ideas 

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• Leninism For a concise, but clear explanation of the salient points
• Lenin and Trotsky: What they Really Stood for by Ted Grant and Alan Woods 
• A History of the Bolshevik Party by Alan Woods. Monumental online book published by Welred. However, detailed and clear index on this page makes dipping in & out easy.
• An excerpt on Leninism and State Capitalism from the work of Noam Chomsky Brief but useful ideas. From "Intellectuals and the State" (1977) §
• Lenin Collection Very large collection of Lenin speeches and writing. Set out chronologically from the Marx2Mao site.
• Lenin's famous speeches Many audio (RealPlayer) speeches of lenin and his contemporaries (Later sections deal with other Comunist leaders) with text in Russian if you wish ....)

see also casahistoria  The political ideologies of  Revolution on the 1917 site of casahistoria

• The crucial Lenin works in full and online:
  • What is to be Done? (Probably the easiest of the three to use..)
  • Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism 
  • The State and Revolution 

General Lenin sites

• Lenin Internet Archive  Stylish with bios, documents and photos. A Useful section is that of Biographical Portraits written by Lenin contemporaries. One of the few Lenin sites being regularly maintained now.
• Vladimir Illyich Lenin Homepage  Chronological layout of source materials, but takes time to find what you need. Best if you are looking for some specific source.  §
• Lenin Social Nerve: Unfortunately this is no longer maintained. The link here is to the excellent Wayback Machine copy. Unfortunately this is missing many images and aspects from the site. it is still worth using.   § As I wrote originally: The site modestly claims: "contains the most information offered on-line about the life and work of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. The site includes over 500 photographs of Lenin, the Russian Revolutions of 1905 and 1917.  The site includes photographs and biographies of the prominent revolutionaries of the time, like Leon Trotsky.  The Biographical section on Lenin contains information gathered to suite the intellectual mind on the controversies and legends of Lenin." The site is very good though... The pick of the general Lenin sites. in case it returns. here is the original site URL:  www.socialnerve.org/lenin/index.html 

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3. Trotsky 

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Biographies

• Leon Trotsky Brief bio from BBC
• Leon Trotsky Bio from the Russian international TV news channel RT Russia of one of the leaders of Russia’s October Revolution in 1917 and later the founder and commander of the Red Army.
• Leon Trotsky  Simple, but well illustrated biography
• My Life By the man himself. Originally published in 1930 by Charles Schribner’s Sons, NY. This is the full version online
• Trotsky Internet Archive Photo Gallery Extensive.
• Many sites now on Frida Kahlo as well as Lenin, Trotsky. Most of dubious value too... Here are a better pair:
  • Frida Kahlo: Well set out. Better than most.
  • Frida Kahlo: Good on images

Ideas and writings

• Trotsky’s History of the Russian Rev  The full text of his monumental study, but well listed for dipping in and out of ……
• Trotsky on the Russian Civil War Well linked page to Trotsky military writings.   §

General sites

• Trotsky Internet archive Useful guide to Trotsky sites. Good image pages.

 

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4. Domestic policy, 1917-24 

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• The History Guide - The Aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution Good article looking at the Lenin years.
• Freedom and Revolution: The Bolshevik Experience  An introduction to the Russian revolution. Originally published in the Irish anarchist journal, Red & Black Revolution

For links to the deaths of the Romanovs, click on the 1917 casahistoria page

 

Politics

• A Guide to Electoral Behaviour in Revolutionary Russia This site gives the result of various elections held in Russian during 1917/19, in several forms of statistical chart (pie, bar graph etc.). Although the information is certainly specialist, and there is no explanation as to what each party stands for, you can draw some interesting conclusions about Bolshevik support.
• Constitution of the Soviet Union, 1918 Undergraduate support article by Professor O'Brien, Dept of History, John Jay College of Criminal Justice,New York
• 'Institution building in Soviet Russia; the case of 'State Kontrol'' by T.F. Remington. Looks at the Bolshevik efforts to establish institutions after the October Revolution. From Slavic Review, 1982.
• 'Russian labor and Bolshevik power after October' by William G Rosenberg (smaller version) Looks at the relationship between the Bolsheviks and organsed labour after October 1917. From Slavic Review (1985). See also: Reply to Rosenberg by Lewin ¦ Reply to Rosenberg by Brovkin ¦ Response by Rosenberg
• 'The Mensheviks' political comeback: elections to the provincial soviets in the spring 1918' by Vladimir Brovkin Looks at the Menshevik recovery in the breathing space (peredyshka) between Brest-Litovsk and the outbreak of Civil War. From Russian review, 1983.
• 'The commune state in Moscow in 1918' by Richard Sakwa The aricle focuses on the problems the Bolshevik leadership faced in matching ideology to practical need in the early months of the Bolshevik state. From Slavic Review, 1987.

• Constituent Assembly  and Workers' Opposition Introductory accounts and good choice of documents from the Spartacus site.
• Cheka and Red Terror also from the Spartacus site. Good sources
• Origins of the Cheka The origins of the Soviet Secret Police, known as the Cheka, from its origins in 1917 until its formal abolition in 1922.
• Felix Dzerzhinsky Bio from the Russian international TV news channel RT Russia of the founder and head of the first Soviet secret police, notorious for its use of torture and mass killings.
• 'The "July uprising" of the Left Socialist Revolutionaries in Moscow 1918' by Lutz Hafner Looks at how the Bolsheviks were able to provide a motive for removing the SR's. From Russian Review, 1991.
• 'Workers' unrest and the Bolsheviks' response in 1919' by Vladimir Brovkin Outlines the growth of worker unrest and the changed response of the Bolshevik to what were "strikes" and became "Menshevik provocation" or "sabotage" ....From Slavic Review, 1990'
• Terrorism and Communism Written  at the height of the Russian Civil War it  represents the Bolshevik defence of the extraordinary means the young workers’ republic had to take in order to defend itself from the almost two dozen armies that were on its soil trying to turn back the revolution.
• Bolshevik opposition to Lenin; G.T. Miasnikov and the Workers Group' by Paul Avrich Outlines the nature of this opposition - especially to NEP and the future demise of Miasnikov after 1923 with his failure to reform the party and his eventual rejection of it.. From Russian Review, 1984. After the middle of the month the site often exceeds its limit and is usually closed but can also be read here from a mirror site.

Kronstadt

• The Kronstadt Uprising by Brian R. Train. A detailed narrative of the event. §
• Kronstadt Uprising Spartacus site
• The Kronstadt Rebellion (1921) Undergraduate support article and source by Professor  O'Brien, Dept of History, John Jay College of Criminal Justice,New York
• The Truth About Kronstadt. Presented in 1992 by Scott Zenkatsu Parker as an Honours Thesis at Bates College
• What was the Kronstadt Rebellion? Huge pdf (80 pages) on the uprising and its implications. Unknown appendix to tome on Russian Revolution...
• Hue and Cry Over Kronstadt By Leon Trotsky Trotsky's angle on the Mutiny.

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5. The Civil War and Intervention 

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• Civil War: Whites v Reds and Allied intervention two introductory pages from BBC history.
• The Russian Civil War This two-page account of the Russian Civil War concentrates on broad trends rather than specific events. Examining the strengths and weaknesses of both main sides, and including information on regional differences and international involvement, this would be an ideal accompaniment to a timeline or narrative. Oddly, it neglects to mention the importance of the railways to the Red Army.
• Russian Civil War , White Army   &  Red Army Thorough accounts and documents from the Spartacus site.
• The Civil War Competent account of war and outcome. Prof Rempel lecture based on Donald W. Treadgold, Twentieth Century Russia, (Westview Press, 1987).
• **Lenin and the First Communist Revolutions, Civil War section From the Museum of Communism. Detailed, with maps.
• Trotsky on the Russian Civil War Well linked page  §
• Red Army Sound initial outline of the origins of the Red Army from Firstworldwar.com
• Anton Denikin Bio from the Russian international TV news channel RT Russia of one of the most successful leaders of the White movement. A Russian general, he nearly succeeded in defeating the Bolshevik forces in 1919 during the Civil War.
• Aleksandr Kolchak Bio from the Russian international TV news channel RT Russia of the Russian naval commander, polar explorer and a leader of the anti-Bolshevik fight during the Russian Civil War
• White Falcons: the White Air Forces 1918-1920 Interesting, if slightly offbeat article on the airforces (especially Finnish)
• White Songs and Poetry The following are several examples from soldiers' songs and poetry from the Russian Civil War. While some of the authors are known, the names of many have been lost or never recorded. This small sample is drawn from research into the White movement in South Russia, in particular General Wrangel and his Crimean government, and it is composed of examples found in the memoir literature of White emigres. But the purple background is .....too purple.....  §
• 'Russian anarchists and the civil war' by Paul Avrich Interesting atricle looking at how The Bolsheviks attempted to enlist anarchist support. From Russian Review, 1968

Allied Intervention 

• Allied Intervention in the Russian Civil War, 1918-1920 - includes overview, chronology, and links to sites about American, Australian, British, and Canadian participation. Good detail for the military details and specifics, from Regiments.org. §
• America's Secret War  American intervention in the Russian Civil War, 1918-1920, with links to documents.
• Prelude to Intervention: The Decision of the United States and Japan to Intervene In Siberia, 1917-1918 Article by Daniel A. Leifheit from the America's secret war site.
• Bloody Battle On Peace Day On November 11, 1918, World War I officially ended, but for American troops in the Russian town of Toulgas, the war was just beginning. Vincent Cortright explains in this, often griping, article.  §
• North Russian Expeditionary Force 1918-1919 - scrapbook of newspaper clippings, photographs, and notes compiled by P.O. George William Smith onboard the HMS Borodino.
• **Much Ado about Nothing: Allied Intervention in the Russian Civil War - Brief article from George Mason University, VA, assesses the significance of Allied involvement in the Russian Civil War.
• Maj. Gen. William S. Graves, U.S. Army – Truly a Soldier of the Old School  Valuable bio of the Commander, American Expeditionary Force, Siberia By Russell Evans of the Americanism Educational League.

 

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6. Economics 

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War Communism 

• War Communism Basic article by Professor Gerhard Rempel. But it is in red!!!
• War Communism: Decree on Grain Procurements, 1918 Document and introduction professor O'Brien, Dept of History, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, New York
'Peasants into Bolsheviks; the utopian essence of War Communism' by Bertrand Patenaude  Article looks at the nature, and degree, of support for war communism. Russian Review, 1995.
• War Communism in Retrospect Clearly referenced, left wing article by Paul Flewers. Difficult but useful.

New Economic Policy

• New Economic Policy Basic article by Professor Gerhard Rempel. But it is in red!!!
• Lenin's NEP (1921) Undergraduate support article and source by Professor  O'Brien, Dept of History, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, New York
• New Economic Policy Spartacus page of accounts and documents
• Lenin and the currency competition. Reflections on the NEP experience. Despite the title this 2006 paper by N Nenovsky for the  International Center of Economic Research has a good chronology of NEP & its background and masses of stats….

 

 

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7. Foreign Policy

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• Brest-Litovsk and its consequences BBC site outlines the key background and points
• Brest-Litovsk Treaty from Spartacus
• Comintern Founded and  To Neoisolationism Introductory articles by Professor Gerhard Rempel
• Comintern Introductory account and documents from the Spartacus site.
• The Comintern Section from the useful 1985 book by Marxist writer Duncan Hallas. This links to the 1923 Russian chapter. For the full index click here.

 

 

 

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8. Witness Accounts and evaluations 

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The following are complete books. All are by writers sympathetic at the time to the general need for change, although it is clear from several that their ideas were changing in the years following the revolution. 

• A Great Beginning, Vladimir Lenin June 19, 1919: In this account Lenin describes the tasks being made throughout the country to rebuild itself during the wrenching famine and Civil War. Lenin describes the "Communist Subbotniks" who are rebuilding the nation in peace, while he also describes the heroic efforts of the workers in the rear, those workers and peasants living under the domination of the white armies.
•   Russia in 1919 by Arthur Ransome online editions of the books written by "Swallows and Amazons" author who befriended Lenin, Trotsky and other revolutionary leaders. This book describes the economic, social and political situation he saw during his visit to Russia in February and March of 1919. In this work Ransome interviews several prominent members of the Soviet government as well as ordinary citizens of Soviet Russia. While support of the Soviet society is evident in this critical but encouraging look at this new government struggling through a civil war, what is not evident is that Arthur Ransome was a British Secret agent working with MI6. (But was Ransome also a spy? See here for the latest archive info: Still an enigma ...)
• The Crisis in Russia a second book by Ransome, written Summer of 1920
• How the Soviets Work, H. N. Brailsford 1920,1927: A critical description of the positives and negatives of the grass-roots councils empowered by the revolution. Much of this material is drawn from 1920 and qualified by his visit in 1927.
• My Disillusionment in Russia, Emma Goldman 1921-22: American anarchist Emma Goldman travels to Russia for the first time in 30 years. She provides a revealing picture on the rampant opportunism throughout the Soviet government and its steady roots throughout the bureaucracy. Goldman explains life in Soviet Russia from the viewpoint of Russian anarchists who wanted to abolish all government right away, and she charts the undemocratic injustices that occur to them as a result.
• The First Time in History, Anna Louise Strong, August 1921 to December, 1923
• Children of Revolution, Anna Louise Strong 1925: Story of the John reed Children's Colony on the Volga, which is as well a story of the whole great structure of Russia
• Left Behind - Baroness Sophie Buxhoeveden's memoirs of life at Imperial court and her harrowing escape through Siberia during the Revolution and Russian Civil War. From Alexandra Palace
• And Now My Soul Is Hardened: Abandoned Children in Soviet Russia, 1918-1930 Warfare, epidemics, and famine left millions of Soviet children homeless during the 1920s. Many became beggars, prostitutes, and thieves, and were denizens of both secluded underworld haunts and bustling train stations. Alan Ball's study of these abandoned children examines their lives and the strategies the government used to remove them from the streets lest they threaten plans to mold a new socialist generation. The "rehabilitation" of these youths and the results years later are an important lesson in Soviet history. 

 

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9. Death of Lenin 

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• Death of Lenin: Guardian Century, 1920-1929  by Arthur Ransome
• Lenin Dies Of Cerebral Hemorrhage from New York Times. This event took place on January 21, 1924, and was reported in the The New York Times the following day.
• Photographs Lenin's death
• Vladimir Ilyich Lenin's full autopsy from Payne, Robert - The life and death of Lenin, New York, 1964.
• Lenin's Testament  (Read the Post script...) In 1922, Lenin composed the following letter, which he intended to be read at the Central Committee. In it, he discusses the leadership of the Bolshevik Party and finds most of his potential successors wanting. The letter, which has often been referred to as "Lenin's testament," intensified a bitter rivalry between Joseph Stalin (1879-1953) and Leon Trotsky. After Lenin's death in 1924, a succession struggle dominated the Bolshevik Party until Stalin emerged as undisputed leader. From Lenin, Vladimir. "Letter to the Congress." As reproduced in A Documentary History of Communism, trans. Max Eastman, ed. Robert Daniels  §
• Lenin Mausoleum - A virtual tour of the Lenin mausoleum in Moscow; requires VRML plugin downloadable on the site.
• Stalin on Lenin:
  • Lenin as the Leader & Organizer of the Russian Communist  Party Pravda, April 23, 1920 §
  • Speech at the 2nd All-Union Congress of Soviets Jan 26, 1924  
  • Lenin (1924)  §
• Trotsky on Lenin:
  • Lenin Dead (essay)
  • On Lenin's Last Testament (1926)

For the succession & rise of Stalin see Stalin: Background & rise to power in the casahistoria Stalin's Russia page

And finally, something different..... 

• Statues and portraits of Lenin and
• Lenins of the world - A compilation of surviving Lenin statues:  Yes, these really are sites of photographs of surviving Lenin statues...  Given the images, this second one takes a long time to load. As the site author writes: "When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Lenin statues were pushed over and beheaded as a symbol of the society's new openness. (That means in the countries occupied by the Russians). In Russia Lenin statues are still a common sight. On this page I have put together the Lenin statues over the world that are known to me. In my mind the communist system was terrible and this page is NOT a tribute to Lenin. It is a tribute to cool propaganda statues and the work of the sculptors."  §
• A Christian burial for Lenin? (a country debates the issue) Seventy five after the death of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, his body, embalmed in a mausoleum in Moscow's Red Square, is the subject of political controversy...
• The collapse of the Lenin personality cult in Soviet Russia, 1985-1995. (political leader Vladimir Ilich Lenin) - 13 pages, January 01 1998 by Trevor J. Smith, Historian Accessible free now only to US library card holders....

 

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10. Historical Analysis 

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• The Legacies of Revolution Richard Pipes presents an indictment of the Russian Revolution, its violence, consequences, and the relationship of Leninism to Stalinism.  §
• The End of the Revolution? Sheila Fitzpatrick, one of the most prominent historians of the USSR, discusses in this passage from her history of the revolution the difficulties in studying 1917 and in determining when the Russian Revolution ended. Her periodization has become the most influential way of viewing the Russian Revolution as a twenty-year process.  §
• Censored by His Own Regime 1996 review article by by Orlando Figes which discusses the view emrging of Lenin with the opening of the Russian secret archives. Casts useful light on the character of Lenin
• Vladimir Ilyich Lenin - David Remnick's commentary on the life and legacy of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin.
• Balance Sheet of October - Trotskyist overview of the Bolshevik rise to power and the Lenin state by Ted Grant

 

 

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11. General link sites to the period 

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• The Russian Revolution This is a very good place to start. It has many links to sites on the background and events of the Revolution. A useful collection of annotated links to other sites relating to the Russian Revolution. It is very suitable for IB Level
• Revolution of 1917  Presentation by Professor Gerhard Rempel, Western New England College.
• Russian Studies on the Internet   A very thorough, and quite academic listing of sites relevant to Russian History. For serious casahistorians in particular, but difficult to navigate.
• Chronology of Russian History: Soviet Period A well presented university site, looking at the grand sweep of Russian/Soviet history from a chronological position. Good linked access to documents. §
• ‘Revolutionary Silhouettes’ Written by Anatoly Vasilievich Lunacharsky in 1923, the ‘Revolutionary Silhouettes’ are a series of accounts dealing with leading figures of the revolution, including Lenin and Trotsky. Lunacharsky, who was a member of the USSR’s first government, knew these people personally, and each silhouette is a mixture of biography, reminiscence and examination.

Who is who?: Brief biographies of key figures during the Revolutionary period
Glossary: Explanation of the main events, words, places connected with Russia, 1917-41

 

Links to written documentary evidence: 

• History of the Soviet Union This website of translated documents by the Univ of East Anglia is designed to give students easy access to a wide selection of sources on Russian history translated into English and available electronically.
• Internet Modern History Sourcebook: Russian Revolution Key Documents on the revolutionary period
• PLP translations: an enormous number of books/documents translated by Computer Based Learning Unit, University of Leeds. This links to the enormous index. Good for browsing for sample documents - but you need a general idea of what/who you are looking for as the index is author based, not thematic.

Visual 

• The Chairman Smiles: Soviet Posters "By 1930, propaganda focuses on political discipline and the Five Year Plans, ambitious programs for the collectivization of agriculture and establishment of heavy industry. The posters give a powerful, dynamic impression, using photomontage, compositions with diagonal lines, and strong contrasts in colours and shapes"
• Red Scare, An Image Database An off beat site dedicated to revolutionary imagery (not just 1917) and how others portrayed it. 
• Revolutionary Posters The artwork of the Russian Revolution is justifiably famous. This page contains seven large, full colour posters, along with brief annotation.
• The Soviet Poster- Revolution by Design Clearly explained and illustrated sections on the main aspects of the poster during particular political periods.
• Soviet Constructivistic propaganda 1920 - 1929 Visually interesting site of examples of constructive agitprop..

        For extensive links to the events of Stalin's Russia go to the casahistoria Stalin 1927-39 site

        For extensive links to the events of 1917 go to the casahistoria 1917 site 

 

the casahistoria Russia/USSR core sites:

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  Background to Revolution
  1917 Revolutions
  Lenin´s Russia  
  Stalin's Russia 1927-39   
  Stalin: Economics & Terror, 1927-41  

 

 

 

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  v10.03/07.11