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Russian Revolution

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Submitted By zachmagik
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Russia has never been a happy place. Since the 12th Century it has been bogged down in poverty, horrific living conditions, and an extremely separated class system. It took many years for the workers and slaves of Russian life to finally organize themselves and revolt against the causes of such hardship; many years of pain, suffering, and oppression that were brought on by the czars. It was this stagnant suffering that would finally begin to lift, and eventually bring power to the Bolsheviks and communism to Russia. Many revolutionaries encouraged killing, robbery, and used terror to advance their effort. However, there were other kinds of revolutionaries, some violent, some not. Gorky, Dostoevsky, and Turgenev all contributed to the progress of the revolution by communicating through literature. All four books were intended to identify critical issues of life, to instigate social and political changes throughout Russia, and to wholly improve Russian life. Gorky’s My Childhood explains the terrible conditions Russia peasants faced. Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons represents the struggle between two ideologies, romanticism and liberalism. Gorky’s next book Mother is the idea of insurgency cells and how a group with no distinct leader can be effective. Finally, Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Possessed shows how violence can be a major tool in fuelling a rebellion, although it also shows how extreme nihilism is self-destructive. Simply listing the problems with Russia up to the 19th and early 20th century would be pointless, because there were numerous factors that contributed to the discontentment of the society. However I will discuss how the three authors present the “sons,” or the revolutionary generation, and explain the main themes they were opposed to. I will also be discussing how the authors analyzed the lives of the revolutionaries in the 19th and 20th centuries, and

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