Pierre Broue

mdeans
Posts: 10 Joined: 13-04-07
Submitted by mdeans on 20 August, 2008 - 07:13.

I'm wondering if anyone has read Broue's history of the German revolutionary wave and what their opinion of it is. I know he was a trot but is it still worth reading? seems to be the most readily available history in English??

SW
Posts: 11 Joined: 02-04-07
20 August, 2008 - 09:00

The book is not so much a history of the German revolution as such but rather is a very detailed (even excruciating) examination of what German leftists and the Comintern were thinking during the revolution. The author's perspective can be crudely summed up as: Lenin is always right. If you wish to understand the perspectives of the various strands of Leninism during this period, the book is illuminating if wearisome. If you consider that Leninism is fit only for the dustbin of history, do not waste your money: it is very unlikely that your patience will hold out until the end of the book.

catch "unpractical[sic] and blinkered"
Posts: 10035 Joined: 07-02-06 Location: London
20 August, 2008 - 09:03

I haven't read it, and SW's description just put me off. If you haven't seen it, Ikarus' account of the Wilhelmshaven revolt is very good: http://libcom.org/library/wilhelmshaven-revolt-ikarus

SW
Posts: 11 Joined: 02-04-07
20 August, 2008 - 18:10

You can browse through some pages from the Broue book over at Google books

Feighnt "the definition of "nobody important""
Posts: 958 Joined: 20-07-06 Location: canada, nanaimo
21 August, 2008 - 02:43

i feel thankfully very vindicated in my opinions by what SW just said. i read a portion of the book, but i found it hideously tiresome. there's almost zero focus on the actual movement, the actual struggle of the revolution... all i saw was a focus on inter-party squabbles. and, beside that, despite that (as far as i can tell) Lenin had next to no relevance to the German Revolution, something like every second page the author stops and does a "meanwhile, over in russia..." and tells us what Lenin thinks of things! it'd be akin to reading a history of the French Revolution which *constantly* stops to tell us what George Washington over in USA thinks of the whole development.

frankly, i tried to give the book a chance, but it just kept up with the above-mentioned practices... after a while, i found the whole ordeal of reading through the book to be, as SW said, "excruciating," and i couldnt bother to trudge through the rest.

i cannot recommend the book in the slightest.

mdeans
Posts: 10 Joined: 13-04-07
21 August, 2008 - 03:59

Thanks, exactly what I wanted to know! In that case is there a good broad history of the movement or only episodes from it like the Wilhelmshaven Revolt?