Russia

Author Antony Beevor
Narrator Rob Heaps
Publisher Orion
Run Time 22 hours and 4 minutes
Format Audio
Genre History, Revolutions, uprisings, rebellions.

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What to expect

'A masterpiece of history'
DAILY TELEGRAPH

Between 1917 and 1921 a devastating struggle took place in Russia following the collapse of the Tsarist empire. Many regard this savage civil war as the most influential event of the modern era. An incompatible White alliance of moderate socialists and reactionary monarchists stood little chance against Trotsky's Red Army and Lenin's single-minded Communist dictatorship. Terror begat terror, which in turn led to even greater cruelty with man's inhumanity to man, woman and child. The struggle became a world war by proxy as Churchill deployed weaponry and troops from the British empire, while armed forces from the United States, France, Italy, Japan, Poland and Czechoslovakia played rival parts.

Using the most up to date scholarship and archival research, Antony Beevor, author of the acclaimed international bestseller Stalingrad, assembles the complete picture in a gripping narrative that conveys the conflict through the eyes of everyone from the worker on the streets of Petrograd to the cavalry officer on the battlefield and the woman doctor in an improvised hospital.

Critics Review

A magnificent piece of work – as superbly researched and original as Stalingrad, and compellingly told by a historian at the top of his powers. So much of the tragic story of Russia and the bloodlands of Eastern Europe over the past century make sense after reading Antony Beevor’s epic and often shocking tale of revolution, civil war, oppression, starvation, brutality and shifting borders; if anyone needs to know why history matters, this book has the answers. Stunning.
James Holland
Brilliant and utterly readable.
Antonia Fraser
In Stalingrad, Berlin and The Second World War, Antony Beevor transformed military history by evoking the experiences of those who fought and suffered in some the greatest wars of the twentieth century. Now he has given us what may be his most brilliant book to date – a masterpiece of historical imagination, in which the tragedy and horror of this colossal struggle is recaptured, in its impact on everyday life as well as its military dimensions, as never before. This is a great book, whose depiction of savage inhumanity speaks powerfully to our present condition.
John Gray
In this brilliant marshalling of a notoriously complex history, Antony Beevor opens up a magisterial canvas of terror and tragedy.
Colin Thubron
A completely riveting account of how the Russian Revolution, which started with such high hopes and idealism, degenerated into a tangle of civil conflicts marked by hideous cruelty on all sides. Antony Beevor brings his great gifts for narrative and his deep interest in the people who both make history and suffer it to illuminate that crucial period whose consequences we are still living with today.
Margaret MacMillan
Beevor, best known for his formidable book Stalingrad, commands authority as a historian because his research is comprehensive and his conclusions free of political agenda. He’s a skilled writer, but his prose is not what makes his books special. Rather, it’s the confidence that his authority conveys – one senses that he knows his subject as well as anyone. He allows his mountain of evidence to speak for itself, simply charting the course of this horrible war, exposing its boundless cruelty. This is easily the most horrifying war story I’ve ever read. One wonders how Russia could ever contain so much suffering.
THE TIMES, Book of the Week
Antony Beevor’s Russia is a masterpiece of history – and a harrowing lesson for today… This is a hugely complex story, and Beevor tells it supremely well. The book is groundbreaking in its use of original evidence from many archives; it adds new facts, tests old claims and demolishes myths on both sides. It is impressively objective..
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH
Beevor has provided an illuminating account of one of the darkest, and most misunderstood, periods of 20th-century history. It should be essential reading for anyone with an interest in the origins of Soviet Russia.
MILITARY HISTORY MATTERS
A gripping narrative history of one of the most complex episodes in modern Russian history… An impressive aspect of Beevor’s latest book lies in the variety of its sources, from accounts of ill-tempered debates inside Lenin’s Bolshevik Party to cocaine-snorting officers in the White resistance army… This combination of clarity with vividness is Beevor’s defining strength as a historian. But he also never shies from the most difficult subject – violence.
SUNDAY TIMES CULTURE
The book is a masterpiece.
THE SPECTATOR, lead review
Antony Beevor’s Russia – Revolution and Civil War makes compelling use of witness testimony including from Russian archives. . . Beevor hits his stride with the formation of the Volunteer Army and rising military opposition to the Bolsheviks. . . As an account of internecine rivalry the book has panoramic sweep.
FINANCIAL TIMES
A wonderfully lucid writer who marshals the extensive material with great verve and understanding. . . Beevor has captured the tragedy in mesmerising detail.
OBSERVER
A mass of chilling contemporary testimony in a new history of the 1917-21 Russian experience, written by British historian Antony Beevor, who is winning plaudits around the world.
BLOOMBERG.COM
Beevor weaves his way through the enormous complexities of these years with intelligence, wit, and a talent for describing individuals and events. As one might expect he is in his element when describing battles, campaigns, and the down-to-earth realities of war. He conveys well the appalling savagery, casual violence and suffering brought on by the Civil War.
TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT
Beevor is a fine historian – diligent, conscientious and knowledgeable, with a long list of excellent books behind him. This volume is well researched and full of telling detail.
MAIL ON SUNDAY
A compelling account of one of the most dramatic episodes in Russian history… Antony Beevor [is] a master chronicler of diplomatic as well as military history.
Bruce Clark, The Tablet
This grimly magnificent book… is a mind-bogglingly complex story, but Beevor tells it extremely well, demolishing myths on all sides.
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH, Best Holiday Reads
Antony Beevor’s highly readable Russia – Revolution and Civil War should be required for anyone (which should be everyone) interested in that complex tortured land.
THE TIMES, Writers' Favourite Books of the Year
Superb… what he does so well is mix the big strategic picture with the everyday lives of people at that time.
Clive Myrie in the DAILY MAIL

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