Revolutionary Dreams Utopian Vision and Experimental Life in the Russian Revolution |
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| Author:
| Stites, Richard |
| ISBN: | 978-0-19-505536-8 |
| Publication Date: | Dec 1988 |
| Publisher: | Oxford University Press, Incorporated
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| Book Format: | Hardback |
| List Price: | AUD $238.18AUD $371.00 |
Book Description:
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In this study, historian Richard Stites offers a vivid portrayal of revolutionary life and the cultural factors--myth, ritual, cult, and symbol--that sustained it, and describes the principal forms of utopian thinking and experimental impulse. Analyzing the inevitable clash between the authoritarian elements in the Bolshevik's vision and the libertarian behavior and aspirations of large segments of the population, Stites interprets the pathos of utopian fantasy as the key to the...
More DescriptionIn this study, historian Richard Stites offers a vivid portrayal of revolutionary life and the cultural factors--myth, ritual, cult, and symbol--that sustained it, and describes the principal forms of utopian thinking and experimental impulse. Analyzing the inevitable clash between the authoritarian elements in the Bolshevik's vision and the libertarian behavior and aspirations of large segments of the population, Stites interprets the pathos of utopian fantasy as the key to the emotional force of the Bolshevik revolution which gave way in the early 1930s to bureaucratic state centralism and a theology of Stalinism.