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> it never had one. How can you say that? Literacy was once a very strong proxy to wealth, and still retains a connection today. Books have been fundamental to

> it never had one. How can you say that? Literacy was once a very strong proxy to wealth, and still retains a connection today. Books have been fundamental to many aspects of human history. If Russia never had a culture of reading, then how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television?

wahern 6y ago
> how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television? It didn't and couldn't. That was the conceit and power behind Lenin's "vanguard" concept. Only a small minority needed to be ideologically driven; everybody else could and did join sides based on more practical, individualized motivations. See, generally, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanguardism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanguardism That said, I'm not trying to opine on whether, when, and how popular book reading was or still is.
- monadic2 6y ago
  I agree with your statement, but I feel like it's rather splitting hairs in terms of the entire conversation. Both the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks came out of Iskra (and it's impossible to describe Lenin without it), and reading culture very much fueled the rise of the vanguard and Lenin's immense popularity. The narrative passing from Lenin to Stalin was also driven by essays in newspapers by political figures. Reading culture was inseparable from political culture at the time!
robjan 6y ago
In most democracies (or allusions thereof) political parties each release a manifesto before elections. Most people don't read them.
cat199 6y ago
> If Russia never had a culture of reading, then how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television? not disagreeing with your premise, but - assuming this to be accurate (leaving out alot of factors), nothing says small number of people couldn't read it and then go around verbally agitating everyone else. that said literacy was fairly high in those times and i agree reading was very common
- wahern 6y ago
  Literacy in Russia was low during the Russian Revolution. The Russian Empire was one of the last to abolish serfdom in Europe, and the parts where serfdom was abolished earliest, industrialization the greatest, and literacy the highest (e.g. Poland) were parts that had separated by the time of the 1917 Russian Revolution. Also, the monarchy was toppled by an ideologically diverse group. The Bolsheviks would have to fight a civil war before they could institute the Soviet Union. It's really not plausible that any significant number of Russians were spurred into action by reading the Communist Manifesto. Now, undoubtedly some elite group of radicals did just that, but that doesn't require widespread literacy, let alone widespread consumption of sophisticated literature.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> If Russia never had a culture of reading, then how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television? It didn't. The central (though far from only) divergence of Leninism from classical Marxism to allow it to work in early 20th Century Russia, which wasn't the kind of advanced (even by mid-late 19th Century standards) liberal industrial capitalist regime to which the Communist Manifesto was directed, was the adoption of vanguardism, in which broad class consciousness and awareness of class theory by the proletariat was abandoned as a requirement for Communist revolution in favor of authoritarian leadership of the masses by a narrow intellectual elite. A major justification for Leninism was the belief by Russian Communists of the time that what you describe could not happen in Russia. (I don't assert that the reason for that is or is not anything to do with culture of reading, but the Communist Revolution certainly does not support your thesis in the way you suggest.)
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
Mediterraneo10 6y ago
> If Russia never had a culture of reading, then how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television? Firstly, the leaders whom the Bolsheviks overthrew in October 1917 were not familiar to most Russians. The Provisional Government instituted after the February Revolution was a messy affair. Committed Bolsheviks were a minority at the time of the Russian Revolution. However, there were just enough of them in the railroads, ports, army and other key infrastructure that they could carry out a coup against the Provisional Government. As with many radical movements, most of the ordinary Bolshevik sympathizers had never actually read the foundational texts of Communism (Marx' writings are often a challenge even for intellectuals). They only knew some simple agitprop distillations thereof. That the Communist regime spent the whole 1920s and early 1930s carrying out literacy campaigns and establishing written standards for most of Russia's languages also underscores how little of a culture of reading existed in the country pre-1917 outside the elite cities like Moscow and Saint-Petersburg.
Kamanin 6y ago
It didn't. The fact is Russian Empire was very illiterate populationюThe thing is dew to the fact that the big part of highest society was well educated with French and German culture the lowest society was ready to follow everyone who will level up their standard of living. The same practically was in the Germany with nazi and the same was in USA. The low level reading always lead to misunderstanding between the government and people. Understand me in a right way, When it was USSR the population was very educated but there were also such people as we call it intelligentsia who were disappointed with the situation in the country and it grew into the protests and to the GuLAG but this is another story :)I am sure people need to travel to grow their mind, their scope... get aquatinted with other cultures.

wahern 6y ago

> how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television? It didn't and couldn't. That was the conceit and power behind Lenin's "vanguard" concept. Only a small minority needed to be ideologically driven; everybody else could and did join sides based on more practical, individualized motivations. See, generally, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanguardism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanguardism That said, I'm not trying to opine on whether, when, and how popular book reading was or still is.

monadic2 6y ago
I agree with your statement, but I feel like it's rather splitting hairs in terms of the entire conversation. Both the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks came out of Iskra (and it's impossible to describe Lenin without it), and reading culture very much fueled the rise of the vanguard and Lenin's immense popularity. The narrative passing from Lenin to Stalin was also driven by essays in newspapers by political figures. Reading culture was inseparable from political culture at the time!

robjan 6y ago

In most democracies (or allusions thereof) political parties each release a manifesto before elections. Most people don't read them.

cat199 6y ago

> If Russia never had a culture of reading, then how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television? not disagreeing with your premise, but - assuming this to be accurate (leaving out alot of factors), nothing says small number of people couldn't read it and then go around verbally agitating everyone else. that said literacy was fairly high in those times and i agree reading was very common

wahern 6y ago
Literacy in Russia was low during the Russian Revolution. The Russian Empire was one of the last to abolish serfdom in Europe, and the parts where serfdom was abolished earliest, industrialization the greatest, and literacy the highest (e.g. Poland) were parts that had separated by the time of the 1917 Russian Revolution. Also, the monarchy was toppled by an ideologically diverse group. The Bolsheviks would have to fight a civil war before they could institute the Soviet Union. It's really not plausible that any significant number of Russians were spurred into action by reading the Communist Manifesto. Now, undoubtedly some elite group of radicals did just that, but that doesn't require widespread literacy, let alone widespread consumption of sophisticated literature.

dragonwriter 6y ago

> If Russia never had a culture of reading, then how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television? It didn't. The central (though far from only) divergence of Leninism from classical Marxism to allow it to work in early 20th Century Russia, which wasn't the kind of advanced (even by mid-late 19th Century standards) liberal industrial capitalist regime to which the Communist Manifesto was directed, was the adoption of vanguardism, in which broad class consciousness and awareness of class theory by the proletariat was abandoned as a requirement for Communist revolution in favor of authoritarian leadership of the masses by a narrow intellectual elite. A major justification for Leninism was the belief by Russian Communists of the time that what you describe could not happen in Russia. (I don't assert that the reason for that is or is not anything to do with culture of reading, but the Communist Revolution certainly does not support your thesis in the way you suggest.)

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

Mediterraneo10 6y ago

> If Russia never had a culture of reading, then how does the Communist Manifesto drive an entire society, millions of people, to overthrow its familial leaders before the era of television? Firstly, the leaders whom the Bolsheviks overthrew in October 1917 were not familiar to most Russians. The Provisional Government instituted after the February Revolution was a messy affair. Committed Bolsheviks were a minority at the time of the Russian Revolution. However, there were just enough of them in the railroads, ports, army and other key infrastructure that they could carry out a coup against the Provisional Government. As with many radical movements, most of the ordinary Bolshevik sympathizers had never actually read the foundational texts of Communism (Marx' writings are often a challenge even for intellectuals). They only knew some simple agitprop distillations thereof. That the Communist regime spent the whole 1920s and early 1930s carrying out literacy campaigns and establishing written standards for most of Russia's languages also underscores how little of a culture of reading existed in the country pre-1917 outside the elite cities like Moscow and Saint-Petersburg.

Kamanin 6y ago

It didn't. The fact is Russian Empire was very illiterate populationюThe thing is dew to the fact that the big part of highest society was well educated with French and German culture the lowest society was ready to follow everyone who will level up their standard of living. The same practically was in the Germany with nazi and the same was in USA. The low level reading always lead to misunderstanding between the government and people. Understand me in a right way, When it was USSR the population was very educated but there were also such people as we call it intelligentsia who were disappointed with the situation in the country and it grew into the protests and to the GuLAG but this is another story :)I am sure people need to travel to grow their mind, their scope... get aquatinted with other cultures.