|
|
Article: Stalin: A Biography.(Book review)
- Article from:
- The Historian
- Article date:
- March 22, 2007
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2007 Phi Alpha Theta, History Honor Society, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
Stalin: A Biography. By Robert Service. (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2005. Pp. xi, 715. $29.95.)
The story is compelling. A cunning intriguer with a memory for slights outmaneuvers brilliant rivals to gain power and rule the Soviet Union for almost three decades. The transformations, the human cost, the wartime victory, and Cold War gyrations are familiar. Robert C. Tucker and Dmitry Volkogonov have shown the dictator's personality. (2) Simon Sebag Montefiori in The Court of the Red Tsar [2004] describes Stalin's perverse inner circle.
Robert Service portrays Stalin as effective and complex. Uncouth, cruel, and a predator ...