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A study of one of the greatest leaders in the history of the Soviet Union.
From the author of Lenin: The Definitive Biography and Comrades: A History of World Communism, Trotsky: A Biography finally offers an impartial reading of Leon Trotsky: a leader who played a key role in the creation of the Soviet Union. In this masterful book, Robert Service challenges the romantic clichés that surround him, such as that of the intellectual revolutionary martyred by Stalin and that of the pure, humanitarian soul unjustly persecuted.
To write *Trotsky: A Biography* , Service researched previously unexplored archives in Moscow and the Hoover Institution, accessed diaries and letters, recovered newspapers and pamphlets, and used his vast knowledge of Russian history to paint a new portrait of the man, his legacy, and the world of his time. The result of so much research is a fascinating study, a must-read for those who prefer to understand the men and their ideas without ideological filters.
"This book is the first full-length biography of Trotsky to be written outside Russia by an author we consider a Trotskyist. Trotsky himself wrote a vivid set of memoirs in 1930, ten years before his death. (...) But I contend that the leader was selective, evasive, and self-aggrandizing in his account, and that his followers failed to ask many uncomfortable and necessary questions about him. (...) Trotsky and his followers wrote books that gained lasting influence far beyond the perimeter of the political far left. Their highly questionable judgments were too often treated as the last word on the subject. That was what they wanted. The history of the Russian Revolution, however, deserves a more investigative approach, and this biography intends to contribute to that." - Robert Service
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