Young Guard

Alexander Fadeyev entered Soviet literature and at once justly occupied a place in the top ranks with his novel The Rout, a supremely striking book, which is, perhaps, the most stern and striking of the books about the Civil War.The last finished work was The Young Guard, a similarly stern, truthful novel about the Great Patriotic War, the German occupation, the tragic and decisive year of 1942.The writer turned grey, stepped past the borders of thirty, forty and fifty years of age, but his own revolutionary youth was ever before him as a period of inestimable value which make him kin with the ideas of Bolshevism - and for that he was thankful to his youth and loved it. The fact that it was namely Fadeyev who in the fourth year of the Patriotic War began to write about the Komsomols of Krasnodon was no accident.The Tragedy of the events in Krasnodon did not disconcert him. On the contrary, it attracted him.The Rout was written when the Civil Was had ended victoriously; The Young Guard was written when the war was drawing to a victorious close. Fadeyev wanted to show the full force of what that cost and what qualities people must have in order ultimately to win in such a war, in order to win in the future no matter in what circumstances. There is no doubt that that was the inner feeling with which The Young Guard was written.

Tirado provides a fascinating and valuable account of the beginnings of an organized youth movement in revolutionary Russia and the founding of the Komsomol. Forming organizations to protect and advance group interests was one of the most striking features of the Russian Revolution of 1917; youth did not lag behind. . . . [This volume] is a valuable contribution to the history of the Russian Revolution and early Soviet state. Russian Review This book examines in detail the formation of the Communist Youth League or Komsomol since its inception in 1917 and presents a social and institutional history of the organization and its impact on the first decade of Soviet power. By concentrating on Petrograd up to 1920 and by using a broad range of sources, this unusual study provides a clearer perspective on the mass efforts of Soviet youth during the early consolidation of the revolution. It describes the origins of the Komsomol, its institutionalization in 1918, its development during the Civil War, its economic and educational activities, and its relationship to the Communist Party.

This book looks at Israeli-Palestinian relations through three different conceptual lenses: the individual decision-maker, domestic politics, and the international system. It examines key choices made by Israelis and Palestinians regarding three central issues: the 1947 UN Partition Plan, the Lebanon invasion in 1982, and the 1993 Oslo Agreements.

This book completes the author's study of the sociology of the literary process in Soviet Russia, begun in The Making of the State Reader: Social and Aesthetic Contexts of the Reception of Soviet Literature (Stanford, 1997). The author demonstrates that Socialist Realism is not so much directed as it is self-directed; the transformation of the author into his own censor is the true history of Soviet literature.

This book explains why the Israeli–Palestinian dispute is so difficult to resolve by showing that it consists of multiple distinct conflicts. Because these tend to be conflated into a single conflict, attempts at peace have not worked. Underpinned by conflict theory, observations of those involved and analyses of polling data, the book argues that peace will not be possible until each of the dispute’s distinct conflicts are managed. Early chapters establish a theoretical framework to explain and define the different conflicts. This framework is then applied to the history of the dispute. The actions and perceptions of Israelis and Palestinians make sense when viewed through this framework. The Oslo peace process is examined in detail to explain how and why each side’s expectations were not met. Ultimately, lessons in ways to build a future viable peace are drawn from the failures of the past.

Although it is impossible to trace any one particular theme running through the operas of Michael Tippett, the libretti of his four operas are fascinating to compare. The dense allusions of The Midsummer Marriage (1955), here annotated, gave way to the classical formality of King Priam (1962); the psychoanalytical preoccupations of The Knot Garden (1970) hardly foreshadow the contemporary political commentary of The Ice Break (1977). Each work breaks new ground and provokes unexpected responses. The libretti offer unique introductions to the music, and throw a searching light on the direction of British theatre since 1945.Contents: Operas contained in this volume: The Midsummer Marriage, King Priam, The Knot Garden, The Ice Break; Introduction, Meirion Bowen; A Ritual of Renewal, Paul Driver; 'A Visionary Night', John Lloyd Davies; Music for an Epic, Andrew Clements; A Tempest of Our Time, Meirion Bowen; Stereotypes and Rebirth, Leslie East