The Secret Life Of Joseph Stalin

This account of Stalin's life begins with his early years, the family breakup caused by the suspicion that the boy was the result of an adulterous affair, the abuse by his father and the growth of the traumatized boy into criminal, spy, and finally one of the 20th century's political monsters.

This book brings to life the true story of one of the greatest monsters in modern history. It details Stalin's role before the revolution as an agent provocateur in the Okhrana departments of the Russian Empire. It explains why Stalin was not exposed after the fall of tsarist regime in Russia and tells of the discovery of Stalin's Okhrana files after his rise to power. Most important of all, the author tracks the history of Stalin's St. Petersburg Okhrana file.

From the author of The Last Tsar, the first full-scale life of Stalin to have what no previous biography has fully obtained: the facts. Granted privileged access to Russia's secret archives, Edvard Radzinsky paints a picture of the Soviet strongman as more calculating, ruthless, and blood-crazed than has ever been described or imagined. Stalin was a man for whom power was all, terror a useful weapon, and deceit a constant companion. As Radzinsky narrates the high drama of Stalin's epic quest for domination-first within the Communist Party, then over the Soviet Union and the world-he uncovers the startling truth about this most enigmatic of historical figures. Only now, in the post-Soviet era, can what was suppressed be told: Stalin's long-denied involvement with terrorism as a young revolutionary; the crucial importance of his misunderstood, behind-the-scenes role during the October Revolution; his often hostile relationship with Lenin; the details of his organization of terror, culminating in the infamous show trials of the 1930s; his secret dealings with Hitler, and how they backfired; and the horrifying plans he was making before his death to send the Soviet Union's Jews to concentration camps-tantamount to a potential second Holocaust. Radzinsky also takes an intimate look at Stalin's private life, marked by his turbulent relationship with his wife Nadezhda, and recreates the circumstances that led to her suicide. As he did in The Last Tsar, Radzinsky thrillingly brings the past to life. The Kremlin intrigues, the ceaseless round of double-dealing and back-stabbing, the private worlds of the Soviet Empire's ruling class-all become, in Radzinsky's hands, as gripping and powerful as the great Russian sagas. And the riddle of that most cold-blooded of leaders, a man for whom nothing was sacred in his pursuit of absolute might--and perhaps the greatest mass murderer in Western history--is solved.

A detailed portrait of the complex Russian leader that probes his psychological motivations and legacy.

There can be no doubt that Stalin is one of the most notorious and controversial figures in history. He presents a puzzling paradox for both psychologists and sociologists; he was simultaneously revered, feared, loved, and hated during his lifetime. So much has been written about the life of Joseph Stalin and yet upon closer inspection, he still seems to present us with quite an enigma. His cruelty towards his political opponents and dissidents is well known, but so are his efforts to go out of his way in lifting up the most downtrodden and desperate members of Soviet society, giving them the chance that Tsarist Russia would not. Inside you will read about... ✓ A Change of Weather ✓ The Real Revolution Begins ✓ From Exile to Supreme Leader ✓ A Brave New Word ✓ Stalin’s Gambit ✓ Stalin Makes a Comeback ✓ Defending the Capitol ✓ Going West Stalin is known as a brutish dictator who struck a bargain with Hitler as if he was an old friend, yet it was this same Stalin who would almost singlehandedly save Europe from Nazi occupation. Who was Stalin? What did he really want? In this book we explore the complexities and nuances of the living, breathing conundrum who called himself Joseph Stalin.

In these pages, Stalin's psychology is fully revealed, every atom of his madness explored, every twist of his homicidal logic followed to its ruthless conclusion.

In this biography of Joseph Stalin, Adam Ulam explores the secret of his power, the hold his memory still has over the imagination, the suffering he inflicted upon his own society, the unprecedented triumphs achieved by the Soviet Union under his leadership and the mysteries surrounding his death.

A biography as well as an intellectual portrait, this book explores all aspects of Stalin's tumultuous life and politics, told through his personal library. Stalin, an avid reader from an early age, amassed a surprisingly diverse personal collection of thousands of books, many of which he marked and annotated revealing his intimate thoughts, feelings, and beliefs