Un somme sur un montagne d'orgueil et de naïveté... Consternant, mais un excellent ouvrage. ( )

Trotsky, the real Emmanuel Goldstein, the real Snowball, has always aroused something between fascination, pity, and hero-worship from fellow travelers and sympathetic intellectuals. The idea that someone more intellectual could have led the Soviet Union on a path different than Stalin's is only too tempting for fans of alternate history.

Yet in this new source, the author aims to tear Trotsky down from his pedestal, and he does it hard. To be fair, he describes Trotsky's brilliance, his surprising military leadership, but also his political blunders with no mercy, and also does the most acidic attacks on his rough and arrogant character. Some go too far - I highly doubt that his daughter committed suicide solely because of him, for example. But some repair of distorted history occurs.

With this violent personality, would he have been any better than Lenin or Stalin? Well, those two set the bar abysmally low. In this time and place of black-and-grey morality, any man who offers the slightest chance of redemption is only too willing to be painted as the brightest star.

Still an interesting book, but treat it with a critical eye, as you should any Soviet history. I will leave with the end quote: "Death came early to him because he fought for a cause that was more destructive than he ever imagined." ( )

could not read