Ten Days That Shook the World

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One of the best history books around - Rated
In trying to delineate a consistent argument, historians tend to forget that what really makes a time and place are the sights, sounds and smells of ordinary lives. That is the wonder of this book. It takes you inside the Russian Revolution. Not from an intellectual or factual perspective, but from a real perspective of living through the events as they happen. In no other work can you see the graffiti on walls, feel the fervour of excitement emanating from the people around you, smell the chaos and determination of a society destroying itself from the inside out, so as to re-mould it on a new footing. The author was an American Journalist with Bolshevik leanings and his access-all-areas authority brings you into the melee of revolution in a way that secondary texts never could.

On Reed - Rated
To me this book symbolizes the idea of rebirth, in a way that echoes the glories of the revolts made famous in the past. Yet, while Reed's purpose in the text is to act as a journalist acts, he frequently falls out of costume and lets his passions get the best of him. He often winds up with soldiers who are complete starngers to him, they share the russian language and with this the political cause which unites them all. It is true that Reed is very sympathetic of the Bolsheviki, and it is also true that while he keeps the text open to all the parties which came and went; he still is biased. Reed is very careful of the way he portrays the russians, they are preserved in the delicay of they're Petrograd lives. Which Reed refers to often in a poetic overtone, while some of the best passages about Smolny at night could easily pass for prose. But still, it is the combination of all these traits that allows Reed to mesmorize the reader with desperate propaganda, all of which is authentic. In the end, Reed's retelling of the Bolsheviki revolution is the most accurate [although where Reed has been caught speculating, is duly noted in the text.]Also Reed's version is the most readable for a person with little knowledge of the revolution. As Trotsky's recanting is not only in ten years retrospect, but as well in a cold and arrogant manner, but still it is very informed and well written. If you are into Trotsky, check out "The Revolution Betrayed", if not don't bother it's all good.

The Best Account of the Bolshevik or any other Revolution - Rated
Every student of the Russian revolution should read John Reed's 10 Days that Shook the World. It brings home forcibly that History is not just an academic subject, but something that actually happens to people. However, they should also make sure that they read A.J.P.Taylor's excellent introduction first and make sure they take note of Taylor's warning that Reed was not a historian, but a journalist. This book was not produced in a library, with the author intent on checking and counter checking his facts, but hammered out in the "fog of revolution". Here no one knew what was going on, not the leaders of the revolution, nor their opponents, nor the people in the streets, and certainly not John Reed himself. As Taylor puts it: "the book is a contribution to history not an analysis composed afterwards".

Furthermore Reed is a biased source. It was no accident that the Communist Party of Great Britain first published this book in the UK, for Reed was a committed revolutionary, who wrote for the USA's foremost radical journal 'The Masses'. His purpose was not to produce a dispassionate account, but to inspire his readers and to further the cause of world revolution. Certainly Lenin believed that 'Ten Days that Shook the World' was a powerful weapon for world communism. As Trotsky commented, "Lenin, in his day, desired the incomparable chronicle of Reed to be distributed in millions of copies in all countries of the world".

Therefore the history student must regard this as a highly emotive, slanted, account. Nevertheless it has its own form of purity. Reed's sources are impressive. He knew, and talked to, a host of characters from all sides of the political spectrum and on all levels, both before and during the October Revolution. The book records interviews with people as widely diversified as Lenin, Trotsky, and Kerensky, through to the Bolshevik guards inside the Winter Palace. Furthermore Reed's professionalism as a journalist shines through, for these interviews provide acute pen portraits of the men themselves, as well as recording what they told him. One would expect Reed to write admiringly about Lenin and Trotsky, but he also writes fairly, and with a certain sympathy, about people in the opposite camp, such as Kerensky, Chernov and Schreider, the elderly Major of Petrograd. For instance, when he interviews Kerensky, a man totally opposed to the Bolsheviks, and one about whom Reed is scathing elsewhere, one is aware that Reed appreciates that, though this man is fighting for a different type of revolution, he is still trying to protect something marvellously different from what had been before.

Despite his bias, Reed is admired by both historians and statesmen. A.J.P. Taylor comments that "Reed's book was not only the best account of the Bolshevik revolution, but that it comes close to becoming the best account of any revolution". While George Kennan, the American historian, diplomat and architect of the US Cold War containment policy, who was certainly no lover of Bolshevism, describes the book as: "an account of the events of that time [which] rises above every other contemporary record for its literary power, its penetration, its command of detail".

Both the strength and weakness of Reed's style can be summed up by Taylor's comment that, while he over-dramatized much of the action and was not reliable in all his detail, he "recaptured the spirit of those stirring days" to such an extent that "Bolshevik participants, when they looked back, often based their recollection more on Reed's book than on their own memories". This is certainly true of Trotsky, for there are seventeen page references to Reed in the appendix to his 'The History of the Russian Revolution' and Trotsky quotes Reed both to back up his own opinions and to provide snapshot description of key events.

Ten Days That Shook the World covers the lead up to the October Revolution, through to the end of the Peasants Congress on November 29th. Strangely, Reed never specifies the actual ten days he is referring to, and it was by chance that I came across a reference to them in his near namesake, Christopher Read's book, 'From the Tsar to the Soviets'. Read, with an "a", identifies the last of John Reeds "Ten Days" as November 17. This puts the of the first day as the day of declaration of the Peasants and Workers Government on November 7, and the last as the day of the debate at Smolny, when four leading Bolsheviks resigned.

As Trotsky remarked, "John Reed did not miss one of the dramatic events of the revolution" , and certainly his descriptions of all the key events are superb. Whether he was really present at all of the occasions he describes is perhaps open to question, but certainly his copy provides the authentic sound, feeling and even smell, of being there. Reed's uniqueness is in his descriptions, but he also provides a wealth of detailed information and the reader is deluged with the names of factions, parties, regiments, militias, committees, sub committees, and both major and minor characters from all sides of the political spectrum. Part of Reed's talent is that he gets all this information across without boring, but I have to admit that I stopped noting down the Russian names after covering three sides of foolscap paper. The book also contains both a useful notes and explanations section and valuable source material in the appendixes, but the Penguin edition lacks an index, which would have been useful in so complex a work.

In the final analysis Ten Days That Shook the World may be flawed as a history textbook, but it is a magnificent story. It is a passionate account, told by a true believer, describing an event that he was convinced would make the world a better place. As such, it has its own form of truth.

Finally learn to understand the Russian revolution - Rated
This isn't holiday literature. Very heavy going. Not until the second chapter did I realise where all the footnotes where. In the back of the book. 71 notes consisting over 80 pages, it resembles any scientific book. I was continually using two papers to keep the pages and reading back and forth.

It is an eye-account of an American journalist of the Russian revolution. And as somebody who considers communism to be the best form of society, I had to read about it. It does confirm my opinion luckily, and don't get me started all you capitalists with your argument that it obviously doesn't work. I might be a pessimist here, but capitalism will collapse as much as the mutilated form of communism did in the Soviet Union and it's dependent countries.

The book is very detailed and very interesting to read, it gave me heaps of information on those very important 10 days, over 80 years back now. Anybody who wants to participate in any political discussion should read this as well.

An Up Close Look At The Russian Revolution - Rated
"Ten Days That Shook The World" is the account by John Reed of what he saw during the Russian Revolution. Reed was an American Communist and journalist who is the only American known to be buried in the Kremlin. Throughout this book we read a series of observations and dialogues reported by Reed, virtually without comment, although his bias is apparent. We read his reports of political meetings, encounters with minor officials and his observations of events occurring during those turbulent revolutionary days in Petrograd.

This book is a classic case of missing the forest for the trees. The view is too up close to permit the reader to see the big picture. One does not look here for the history of the Revolution. We look here for its spirit. Here we see the swirling chaos, hear the repeated buzz words and get a feeling for the competing factions which fashioned the Communist tyranny which emerged from the Revolution.

In writing this book, Reed gives the reader a view of himself and other American Communists who saw in the Revolution the future that worked. His view can best be summarized in his comment that, while watching a funeral, he realized that the Russian people no longer needed priests to pray them into heaven because they were building a world brighter than any which heaven promised. This hope is in stark contrast to the now known Communist record.

Overall I enjoyed this book as it taught me some more about the Russian Revolution than I had learned from other books which I had read. For that it was worth reading.