Lenin's Final Fight: Speeches and Writings, 1922-23

by Vladimir Ilich Lenin, George Fyson (Editor)

The record of Lenin's last and most concentrated political battle against a growing privileged layer, as he sought to set the Communist Party on course to strengthen the alliance of workers and peasants and the voluntary union of soviet Republics.

Genres: Lenin, Politics, Russia

352 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1995

About the author

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, leader of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (Bolsheviks), statesman and political theorist. After the October Revolution he served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until his death in 1924 and of the Soviet Union from 1922 until his death in 1924.

Reviews

[Marc Lichtman · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the last year of his life Lenin was fighting a personal battle to stay alive after several strokes and at the same time he was fighting against the increasing bureaucratization of both the Communist Party and the Soviet government. This included attacks on the right to self-determination of the many non-Great-Russian nationalities, which included Ukraine. Putin hates Lenin but has a soft spot for Stalin who like himself wanted to impose the Russian language and Russian culture back onto the peoples who had been freed of this oppression (this is despite the fact that Stalin was Georgian). Putin isn't trying to reestablish the Soviet Union (as President Biden once claimed); he is trying to reestablish what proceeded the Russian Revolution, which was the Russian Empire, ruled by a tsar.

There were many other issues involved, and Trotsky took up Lenin's request to back him in these struggles. It's not a question of what individuals were in the leadership, but of totally different programs which they represented. Trotsky lived (until Stalin had him assassinated in 1940) to try to continue the struggle. Anyone interested in this book should also be interested in Trotsky's The Revolution Betrayed: What Is the Soviet Union and Where Is It Going?, an analysis of Stalinism. Other important books by Trotsky include The Stalin School of Falsification, and History of the Russian Revolution.

While the most recent edition of Lenin's 'Collected Works' includes most (not all) of the writings in this book, you won't have an easy time finding them there. For many years they weren't included at all, and there are still some Stalinists who deny their validity.

Another book well worth reading is Internationalism or Russification by Ivan Dzyuba. First published in Ukrainian in 1968, the author was forced to recant his views, which are essentially Lenin's views on the national question. It's been long out of print in English, but I just heard that some publisher will be getting it back into print.

[Kafkasfriend · Rating 5 out of 5]

Both stirring and heartbreaking, as Lenin sees the perils of Stalinism and the anti-Leninist drive that threatened the socialist movement in Russia.

Comments on bully Russia in the Caucasus are now proven true, even today.

[Nathan Levin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, however, I need to know more about the Revolution because many of the things discussed were relatively new to me.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Nueva y informativa introducción por Jack Barnes y Steve Clark. Recomendada para amplias colecciones académicas con una clientela hispanoparlante erudita.”—Library Journal online. Traducción por la editorial.
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A medida que el capitalismo en el siglo XXI entra en su más profunda crisis económica y social desde las décadas que abarcaron la primera y la segunda guerra imperialista mundial, cuestiones programáticas y estratégicas que estaban en pugna en el movimiento obrero comunista a principios de los años 20 nuevamente cobran peso enorme en determinar las posibilidades de que la clase trabajadora a nivel mundial avance por su línea de marcha histórica hacia la conquista del poder.
—de la introducción

En 1922 y 1923, V.I. Lenin, dirigente central de la primera revolución socialista en el mundo, libró lo que sería su última batalla política. Lo que estaba en juego era si esa revolución continuaría por el curso proletario que llevó al poder a los trabajadores y campesinos del antiguo imperio zarista en octubre de 1917, y sentó las bases para un movimiento revolucionario verdaderamente mundial del pueblo trabajador que se organizaba para emular el ejemplo de los bolcheviques.

[Matthew Quest]

This collection of Lenin's speeches and writings are indispensable for understanding what happened to the Russian Revolution. Many intelligent and well meaning people have viewed this collection as proof that Lenin was not an authoritarian and had discarded the elitism of the vanguard party conception. Instead a close reader will find proof of something more contradictory. He was an advocate of capitalism for Russia in the name of Marxism! It was this reasoning that made Lenin a model for Third World statesmen, who with a radical luster suppressed their own working classes. It is not the type of book that a beginner can read and understand easily. But maybe with this awareness they will see the profound value in it sooner.