СодержаниеIntroduction........................3
Chapter I: The Russian Revolution 1917............8
1.1. The presentation of the question...............8
1.2. The Background of the Revolution 1917...........9
1.3. Social relations in Russia 1917 through the eyes of American/ British observers.....................16
Chapter II: American/ British observers about the level of life in Russia 1917.......................... 25
2.1. The level of life in Russia 1917 through the eyes of American/ British observers: economic causes of the Russian Revolution...25
2.2. The Wages and cost of living before and during the revolution.29
2.3. The cultural life 1917..................36
Chapter III: The attitude of American/ British observers to the Russian revolutionaries........................38
3.1. Lenin through the eyes of American/ British observers.....38
3.2. The attitude towards the Bolsheviks........... 43
Chapter IV: A choice of a political positions by the Russian intelligency in the autumn of 1917 from the point of view of Russian and American/ British historians.....................52
4.1. The attitude of American/ British observers to Russian intelligency 1917............................52
4.2. Historiographical situation................58
Conclusion........................66
Bibliography........................68ВведениеThe theme of this research is "The attitude of American/ British observers to the Russian Revolution 1917". We try to reveal this question considering the Background of the Revolution 1917, social relations in Russia 1917, the level of life in Russia 1917 through the eyes of American/ British observers and the attitude of American/ British observers to the Russian revolutionaries and intelligency. It is not a simple task because of subjective views of American/ British historians in this question who are apart from the socio-cultural context of Russia.
For the English-speaking authors there are some difficulties in writing Russian history. It is understandable that the attempt to write a history of Russia, since October revolution of 1917 is reckless, and the one who indulgently concerns to this attempt may be will forgive also lacks admitted at its realisation. A history of Soviet Russia written by the Englishman or by American, who didn't know Marx's philosophy thoroughly, who wasn't from Russian, seems especially risky undertaking. But it is justified by necessity to fill in a wide and obvious blank. The books about Western or Central Europe written in Great Britain and the United States, frequently are spoilt by involuntary reliance of their authors that it is possible to understand politics and institutes, for example, of France, Italy, or Germany by analogy to Great Britain or America. To measure Russia, Lenin, Trozki and Stalin by parameters taken at England or at America nobody will decide to do. Before the historian writing about Soviet Russia, at each stage of his work there will be a double task arising before each serious historian: to combine figurative conceptions about ideas and purposes dramatise personal with clear appraisal of general value that has taken place.
In this research it's important for us to describe not only the chronicle of revolutionary events (many authors have already made it), but the history of the political, social and economic systems, which have arisen as a result of these events. Such work should become not the detailed annals of events of the given period, but analysis of those events, which have determined the basic directions of the further development. " Ten days, which have shaken the world " by John Reed (1919) and "My Reminiscences of the Russian Revolution" (1921) by M.Philips Price give an alive picture of the revolution, and we are also interested by the detailed description in English of period of civil war and find it in "History of the Russian revolution, 1917-1921. " by W. H. Chamberlin, 1935.
In works devoted to the modern history there are some dangers. But for the historian writing about more remote past there are larger dangers: the evidences in due course disappear, decay, the time reduces them up to such amount which historian can cope with, but it does not mean at all that the most valuable facts are kept. They say usually that there are special difficulties before the historian writing about Soviet Russia, because of the lack of sources or because of their unreliability. If in the period after 1928 it seems to be so, but the period considered here does not give the grounds to assert so: there are a lot of materials of this period and the facts in them are informed with exclusive frЛитература45. Казанин ,И. Е. Некоторые аспекты репрессивной политики советской власти по отношению к русской интеллигенции (октябрь 1917 - 1919 год)// Вестник ВолгГУ. Серия 4. История. Философия. Волгоград., 1997;
46. Карр Э. История советской России. Большевистская революция 1917-1923. Т. 1, 2. Москва: Прогресс, 1990;
47. Квакин А.В. Октябрьская революция и идейно-политическое размежевание российской интеллигенции: Теоретико-методологические, источниковедческие, историографические аспекты. Саратов, 1989;
48. Керженцев В. Ещё об интеллигенции // Известия. 1918, 18 октября; Мещеряков Н. Русские сменовеховцы // Красная новь. 1922. № 2;
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