On the Jewish Question
Will be published approx. on 10. August 2027
Book
Paperback/Softback
192 pages
978-1-83674-535-8 (ISBN)
Description
Leon Trotsky, a Jew from Ukraine at the head of a Red Army under the banner of communist universalism, is the antisemites' nightmare. Yet he never wrote a book about what was once called the "Jewish Question." Trotsky once said he was "not a Jew" but rather "an internationalist" - to which Winston Churchill replied: "He was a Jew. He was still a Jew. Nothing could get over that." For the counterrevolution, this polyglot cosmopolitan remains "Leiba Bronstein."
As much as he resisted identification with Judaism, Trotsky had no choice but to wrangle with antisemitism: as Russia's multiethnic working class organized against the Tsar; as Stalinist reaction dragged up old stereotypes; and as fascism threatened the Jewish people with extermination. Trotsky critically examined plans to create a Jewish national territory, either in Palestine or in Birobidzhan.
Today, in the face of the genocide in Gaza, when millions of young Jews are breaking from Zionism, Trotsky's lifelong engagement with the "Jewish question" merits study. For this volume, a team of historians has compiled every word that Trotsky ever wrote about antisemitism and the fight for Jewish liberation, placing well-known essays alongside letters, interviews, and speeches. Together, they form a piercing, urgent corpus - for Trotsky's time and our own.
As much as he resisted identification with Judaism, Trotsky had no choice but to wrangle with antisemitism: as Russia's multiethnic working class organized against the Tsar; as Stalinist reaction dragged up old stereotypes; and as fascism threatened the Jewish people with extermination. Trotsky critically examined plans to create a Jewish national territory, either in Palestine or in Birobidzhan.
Today, in the face of the genocide in Gaza, when millions of young Jews are breaking from Zionism, Trotsky's lifelong engagement with the "Jewish question" merits study. For this volume, a team of historians has compiled every word that Trotsky ever wrote about antisemitism and the fight for Jewish liberation, placing well-known essays alongside letters, interviews, and speeches. Together, they form a piercing, urgent corpus - for Trotsky's time and our own.
More details
Edition
Paperback original
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 210 mm
Width: 140 mm
Weight
250 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-83674-535-8 (9781836745358)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Nathaniel Flakin is a historian, journalist, and tour guide in Berlin. His biography of
Martin Monath: A Jewish Revolutionary Among Nazi Soldiers has been published in
German, English, French, and Spanish. He wrote Revolutionary Berlin: A Walking
Guide as well as the kids book Little Rosa Luxemburg Starts a Big Revolution. He is
the translator of Andrea D'Atri's Bread and Roses: Gender and Class Under
Capitalism. His journalistic work has appeared in Jacobin, Exberliner, The Berliner,
junge Welt, nd, Berliner Zeitung, der Freitag, and he is an editor of the Trotskyist
publications Left Voice and Klasse Gegen Klasse.
Biography Nicholas Bujalski
Nicholas Bujalski is an assistant professor in the Department of History at Oberlin
College, Ohio, where his scholarship and teaching focuses on the Russian, East
European, and Eurasian radical past. His writings have appeared in Modern
Intellectual History, The Russian Review, and Marx & Philosophy Review of Books.
Leon Trotsky was a Marxist writer, theorist and leader. He organized the
insurrection of the October Revolution in Russia in 1917 and then was the
commander of the Red Army in the subsequent civil war. After Lenin's death, Trotsky
led the Left Opposition against Stalin's bureaucratic counterrevolution, and was
exiled in a series of countries before being assassinated in Mexico in 1940.
Enzo Traverso is the Susan and Barton Winokur Professor in the Humanities at
Cornell University. His publications, all translated into various languages, include
more than ten authored and edited books, including The Marxists and the Jewish
Question, The Jews and Germany, Understanding the Nazi Genocide, The Origins of
Nazi Violence, Fire and Blood: The European Civil War, 1914-1945 and Left-Wing
Melancholia: Marxism, History, and Memory.
Martin Monath: A Jewish Revolutionary Among Nazi Soldiers has been published in
German, English, French, and Spanish. He wrote Revolutionary Berlin: A Walking
Guide as well as the kids book Little Rosa Luxemburg Starts a Big Revolution. He is
the translator of Andrea D'Atri's Bread and Roses: Gender and Class Under
Capitalism. His journalistic work has appeared in Jacobin, Exberliner, The Berliner,
junge Welt, nd, Berliner Zeitung, der Freitag, and he is an editor of the Trotskyist
publications Left Voice and Klasse Gegen Klasse.
Biography Nicholas Bujalski
Nicholas Bujalski is an assistant professor in the Department of History at Oberlin
College, Ohio, where his scholarship and teaching focuses on the Russian, East
European, and Eurasian radical past. His writings have appeared in Modern
Intellectual History, The Russian Review, and Marx & Philosophy Review of Books.
Leon Trotsky was a Marxist writer, theorist and leader. He organized the
insurrection of the October Revolution in Russia in 1917 and then was the
commander of the Red Army in the subsequent civil war. After Lenin's death, Trotsky
led the Left Opposition against Stalin's bureaucratic counterrevolution, and was
exiled in a series of countries before being assassinated in Mexico in 1940.
Enzo Traverso is the Susan and Barton Winokur Professor in the Humanities at
Cornell University. His publications, all translated into various languages, include
more than ten authored and edited books, including The Marxists and the Jewish
Question, The Jews and Germany, Understanding the Nazi Genocide, The Origins of
Nazi Violence, Fire and Blood: The European Civil War, 1914-1945 and Left-Wing
Melancholia: Marxism, History, and Memory.