Leon Trotsky [antikvár]

PREFACE This is a small book on a large subject. I have written it for two reasons: first, as an introduction to the life and thought of a major twentieth-century figure, and second, as a political-intellectual criticism of his role in modem history and his commentaries upon it. In a book of this size everything must be compressed. Much has been omitted which in a full-scale biography or poHtical study could not have been: e.g., discussion of Trotsky's writings on China, his numerous articles concerning revolutionary strategy in Europe during the 1920s, his military writings, and his efforts to rebuild a revolutionary movement in the 1930s. But I make no pretense of being comprehensive. I have tried to stay with the main lines of Trotsky's intellectual development, those that may seem central to a serious reader of our moment. Trotsky's ideas are inseparable from his career as Marxist revolutionary; they cannot, or should not, be considered in isolation, as a mere system; they take on vibrancy only when set into their context of striving, debate, com-