Memoirs of Nikita Khrushchev
Volume 1: Commissar, 1918–1945
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Pennsylvania State University Press
Published:15th Jan '13
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
Nikita Khrushchev’s proclamation from the floor of the United Nations that "we will bury you" is one of the most chilling and memorable moments in the history of the Cold War, but from the Cuban Missile Crisis to his criticism of the Soviet ruling structure late in his career the motivation for Khrushchev’s actions wasn’t always clear. Many Americans regarded him as a monster, while in the USSR he was viewed at various times as either hero or traitor. But what was he really like, and what did he really think? Readers of Khrushchev’s memoirs will now be able to answer these questions for themselves (and will discover that what Khrushchev really said at the UN was "we will bury colonialism").
This is the first volume of three in the only complete and fully reliable version of the memoirs available in English. In this volume, Khrushchev recounts how he became politically active as a young worker in Ukraine, how he climbed the ladder of power under Stalin to occupy leading positions in Ukraine and then Moscow, and how as a military commissar he experienced the war against the Nazi invaders. He vividly portrays life in Stalin's inner circle and among the generals who commanded the Soviet armies.
Khrushchev’s sincere reflections upon his own thoughts and feelings add to the value of this unique personal and historical document. Included among the Appendixes is Sergei Khrushchev’s account of how the memoirs were created and smuggled abroad during his father’s retirement.
“Nikita Khrushchev was one of the most important political leaders of the twentieth century. Without his memoirs, neither the rise and fall of the Soviet Union nor the history of the Cold War can be fully understood. By dictating his memoirs and publishing them in the West, Khrushchev transformed himself from the USSR’s leader to one of its first dissidents. His remarkably candid recollections were a harbinger of glasnost to come. Like virtually all memoirs, his have a personal and political agenda, but even what might be called Khrushchev’s ‘myth of himself’ is vital for understanding how this colorful figure could place his contradictory stamp on his country and the world. The fact that the full text of Khrushchev’s memoirs will now be available in English is cause for rejoicing.”
—William Taubman, winner of the 2004 National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for his book Khrushchev: The Man and His Era
“One of the most extraordinary archives of the twentieth century”
—Strobe Talbott, former U.S. Deputy Secretary of State
“Khrushchev had a remarkable memory, and although the style and broad outline of what he has to say will be familiar to those who read the original two-volume English version issued in the early 1970s, the detail he provides here, particularly on the war, adds a great deal.”
—Robert Legvold Foreign Affairs
“But his personal slant, conveyed in the World War II memoirs that make up half of this huge book, is important for understanding the political atmosphere during that colossal struggle. And the detail of his recall, without notes or references, is extraordinary.”
—Robert V. Daniels The New Leader
“Sergei Khrushchev (Thomas J. Watson Jr. Institute, Brown Univ.) has edited an exquisitely detailed, amply documented, remarkably translated first volume of a proposed three-volume translation of his father’s memoirs, based on the four-volume Russian edition of 1999.”
—C.W. Haury Choice
“There is a lot less high politics here than one would expect. Khrushchev’s focus is very often on chance encounters and small vignettes, often told at great length, rather than on reflections on the ‘big picture’ or revelations about key historical events. Yet it is this above all else that makes this work so readable, for it allows Khrushchev’s personality to come through in the text in all its contradictions and complexity.”
—William Tompson Political Science Quarterly
“This volume far exceeds in detail earlier editions of the Khrushchev memoirs and for readers of this journal especially, his observations of the war years are intriguing.”
—Paule Wanke Journal of Military History
ISBN: 9780271058535
Dimensions: 235mm x 156mm x 73mm
Weight: 1293g
1036 pages