Customer Reviews

Russia: The Once and Future Empire From Pre-History to Putin

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Philip Longworth created an excellent survey of Russian history. One of the greatest virtues of this book is its readability. Longworth's writing style is light, and at times humorous. The final section, dealing with the collapse of the Soviet Union and its aftermath is particularly interesting, informative and well-written. It alone makes the purchase of this book worthwhile.

Even at the college level, Russian history is rarely taught as a stand-alone subject in the United States. At best, it is allotted a couple of lecture periods in a general European history class. While Longworth does not cover any particular area in great depth, his work will still be highly informative for the vast majority of its potential audience.

For those looking for depth and analysis, a subject-specific book may be a better choice. There are many good options dealing with various subjects. For 20th-century/WWII history, I highly recommend anything by David Glantz, and Stalin's Wars: From World War to Cold War, 1939-1953 by Geoffrey Roberts

I may be unfair in awarding Mr. Longworth's book only 3 stars. But what do these ratings mean? His book offers nothing new but it is a well written terse synopsis of Russian history. So I rated it at 3 stars. Others might say 4 stars.

Why is it not original? It is mostly based on secondary sources, not new research. The first chapter (claimed as original with some fanfare) delves into pre-history and attempts to find the sources of Russian character (and thus history) in the Russian physical environment. The speculative links between the two are well argued, but the conclusions as to Russian character are very general, thus of little explanatory value in specific history, and are in any case ultimately unprovable. And the book's claim to explain the underlying causes of the periodic rise and fall of Russia also breaks down. Its descriptions make clear that each of the four great "boom and bust" cycles of Russian history had its own reasons for Russia's ascendance and, more particularly, for its decline.

So the book's attempts to suggest "gee whiz" originality fail. But that said, this is a solid and elegantly written overview of Russian history if you want to compress eleven hundred years into about 300 pages. The focus of the book is political history, and in particular the waxing and waning of Russian imperial conquests, but Mr. Longworth often offers broader sociological or even climatological explanations for what--underneath--really drove events beyond the surface politics of the moment.
That approach does offer real value.

So I don't mean to underrate the book. It's not brilliant or terribly original, but it is solid. And if you want a quick read on Russian history, you would do well to purchase it. One complaint, however: Mr. Longworth appears to be among those revisionist historians who put most of the blame for the initiation of the Cold War on the West, in particular the U.S. I think he is totally off base, and his arguments in that regard are thinly argued and even more thinly sourced.

Overview:
This is a well-written bird's eye view of the history of the Russian people. It's argument is that unlike other "empires," Russia's identity/strength doe s not disappear when her Empire falls. Russia has gone through four or five major empires in the past 1300 years. She becomes (relatively) stronger after each fall.

Content:
There isn't much to add that other historians haven't said, aside from the above thesis. But I do want to look at some historiographical interpretations. The author does a good job in descriping the psyche of the Russian people. While fascinating, and having me convinced, it really can't be proven scientifically. But scientific knowledge has its limits, too. The author paints Russian figures "warts and all." Sometimes this leads to too critical an analysis of the Russian church. I was displeased that scant (if any) reference was made to the legend of the conversion to Orthodoxy of the Rus.

Final thoughts:
The book is useful in summarizing difficult parts of history. The narrative is smooth and compelling. Someone commented that the author is a left-ist revisionist historian blaming the West for Russia's ills. Maybe. While I am more "right wing" (I hate the term) than the author, I think there is some truth to the criticisms. One interesting note is the author ends the book (written in 2004) with a note of cautious optimism for Russia. Putin's Constantinian leadership of Russia further strengthened the author's case. This is a good book worth reading.

EDIT: Writing in 2004 he accurately predicted the Ossetian War in 2008. In fact, he mentions that NATO's bombing of Serbia was a check that would later bounce on America. Whether Russia was right or wrong in driving back Gerogian forces, NATO has no grounds to criticize them per the Kosovo precedent.

The central tenet of this book is that, throughout history, Russia has developed a narrative of its own: it rises from chaos to empirehood just after being considered out of game by other nations. The author sees Russia as a sequence of four empires (Kievan Empire, Muscovite Empire, Romanov Empire and Soviet Empire). There are some problems with that notion, since russia can still be considered a empire for imposing its power over other nations, like Chechens, Tatars and many others. Much more interesting - since we are talking of speculations - is the idea that Russia, like China, Japan, India and Persia, is a historical and geographical "a priori", in the sense of being unavoidable. Other nations must act in order to keep existing; such "a prioris", once created, have existed - and probably will keep doing that - anyhow.

However, if his hypothesis is debatable, his descriptive work has a very good quality. He offers a breathtaking overview of russian history, a complex history not to be taken lightly; at some points, as one would expect of such undertakings, his description of events is superficial, maybe even coarse. For instance, he does not save even a single word for Kerensky, one of the most tragicomic characters of russian history and maybe similar in some points to Gorbachev.

If you are a beginner on russian affairs, do not hesitate on reading this book. All in all, it is a very good starting point for russian history, but one should bear in mind that in order to grasp the full weight of a history that is probably one of the most fascinating among nations, it is necessary to turn to other sources. I'd sugest Figes' People's Tragedy as a good next step.

I'm at the outbreak of WW I in this book which I've been reading with enthusasm. Longworth begins witht he land and the early peoples. He seems to have a fine command of the historical literaturte. His writing style is vivid; he points omments; you never miss the context in which the innumerable details are presented. There is a mind and a wit guiding you through the narrative. In the 18th and 19th centuries he pays particular attention tot he expansion of the empire to the south and east[[the former into areas which are concerns today. Highly recommended. I'd never heard of the author before, but will follow up with other of his books.
Read on Kindle..

Considering that world history is barely taught to general public, and Russian history is especially rarely taught even at college level, I decided to read this book. I am convinced there is an obvious reason why history is not an important subject in U.S. schools. This book very accurately covered main points of Russian history, and very convincingly showed the big picture. The author always emphasized both sides of the story and took the reader toward understanding the time, setting, and circumstances of the events that took place. In my opinion, the most relevant, most important and best written section is the time period of 1945 - 2004. This book supported my previous doubts and guesses, and changed my view of the world itself. Great book!

I bought this book after reading the first chapter and was deeply disappointed after that as the author gave no biographical information of even the biggest names in russian history but even worse was the lack of context behind any event. It felt like a Fodors guide listing names and dates and only those of political importance. There was almost nothing about the culture, music, literature, the land, the peoples of Russia. I got tired of looking up in my atlas where a city was as the author would continuously name places with no information about them. One moment you are in the East, and next paragraph in Poland. Save your money.

Philip Longworth's "Russia: The Once and Future Empire from Pre-History To Putin" is an accesible and readable account of Russia's long history for the general reader or as a place to begin reading about Russia.

The author had created a generally good account of Russia's struggles over the centuries from being a great power to being an absolute disaster area and back again. The reader gets a sense of the incredible perseverance and basic strength of the Russian people who have suffered many disasters from foreign invaders, climatic extremes as well as the incompetence of their own rulers during many periods of their history.

I feel the author documents and explains the many risings and fallings of the Russian state from the Kievan Rus to contemporary Russia with skill and tackles many different aspects of Russia in its many incarnations in a way the general reader will enjoy.

My chief concern is that the author completely and utterly understates the absolute evil of the communist regime. At one point, he pontificates that the massive death toll inflicted upon the Russian (as well as Ukrainians, Balts, etc.) was simply accidental! "The massive mortality has been ascribed to genocide, but the charge is unfounded." He further states: "Rather than being deliberately induced, the famine was the consequence of mistaken policy, ruthlessly implemented."

This is sickeningly absurd! One cannot starve, shoot or simply work to death X millions on accident! The Red Army's leadership (often ahead of the curve in many areas such as mobile warfare) was similarly bloodily purged in an orgy of maniacal killing which left the USSR vulnerable when war came.

The author seems to accept Soviet-era pronouncements on economic issues at face value - an absurd and illogical thing to do considering the Orwellian nature of virtually everything the Soviet state put into print! When he comes to the collapse of the USSR, the author is forced to explain it in terms of nebulous, short-term circumstances rather than accept that the communist regime was wasteful, inefficient and corrupt to an unprecedented degree from day one and finally collapsed under the weight of its own accumulated failures.

Though the author has written a highly readable account of Russia's history, his analysis of the Soviet era is so completely wrong as to negate his often insightful accounts of earlier and contemporary eras. I cannot recommend this book.