Book Review: Lenin in Zurich

Authors

Axel Fair-Schulz
Katherine French

Keywords

Lenin, Switzerland, Swiss American, Zurich

Abstract

The recent death of Alexander Solzhenitsyn on August 3rd of this year might prompt a fresh look at that writer's oeuvre. While Solzhenitsyn is mainly associated with well known works, such as One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and The Gulag Archipelago, one should not neglect his less widely known books. Among those is his Lenin in Zurich. This volume should be of particular interest to readers engaged with all things Swiss, given its overt subject matter. One learns much about Switzerland in the early years of the last century as a major locus for Russian emigres. Solzhenitsyn deals not just with the sectarian debates within Bolshevik and Menshevik circles but fleshes out more broadly the entire Marxist spectrum in Switzerland during that time period, ranging from moderate Swiss Social Democrats all the way to Lenin's radical and unyielding revolutionary ethos. In addition, Lenin in Zurich also provides important insights into the mind of one of the 20th centuries most enigmatic writers and literary/philosophical intellectuals, namely the mind of Solzhenitsyn himself.

Recommended Citation

Fair-Schulz, Axel and French, Katherine (2008) "Book Review: Lenin in Zurich," Swiss American Historical Society Review: Vol. 44: No. 3, Article 8.
Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/sahs_review/vol44/iss3/8