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Rating: 
Summary: An excellent read
Review: A well-written book, by a leading professor in the field!! Fitzpatrick has taken many different documents and worked them together to describe what city-life was like in the Soviet 1930's. This is the companion to her book "Stalin's Peasants", which describes peasant life during this same time period. Fitzpatrick describes what the average life of a Russian city-dweller was like, using many different stories. She ends the book by comparing life during this time to three different things. I will let you read the book to see what they are!!
Rating:
Summary: An excellent read
Review: A well-written book, by a leading professor in the field!! Fitzpatrick has taken many different documents and worked them together to describe what city-life was like in the Soviet 1930's. This is the companion to her book "Stalin's Peasants", which describes peasant life during this same time period. Fitzpatrick describes what the average life of a Russian city-dweller was like, using many different stories. She ends the book by comparing life during this time to three different things. I will let you read the book to see what they are!!
Rating: 
Summary: Intriguing glimpse into the everyday misery of 1930s Russia
Review: Fitzpatrick has produced an intriguing book about the miseries of everyday life in Stalin's Russia during the 1930s, when people had to struggle with a world which had been turned upside down by both the revolution and the turmoil of the collectivisation and industrialisation policies of the late 1920s and early 1930s. Using a wealth of sources, she shows with particular clarity the great incompetence of the bureaucracy, where everyone seemed more interested in fighting for influence than in serving the people. She also puts the focus on crime, hooliganism and how the lot of women was slowly improved through the chance to get a decent education. Fitzpatrick also does not disappoint with the crushing effect of the nightmare years of 1936-1938, when millions were executed or imprisoned during the Great Purge. A vital read for all those fascinated by the topic of Stalinism
Rating:
Summary: Stalinism from a different angle.
Review: I've read several dozen works on the Soviet era between the October revolution and the Second World War, from Pipes to Conquest and including Solzeynitsin's "Gulag" trilogy. While Solzeynitsin focused on the impact of those who were swept up in the great terror of the '30s, "Everyday Stalinism" looks at the impact on the average individual's daily life in the cities of the USSR. Unlike the Pipes/Conquest terror-as-a-psychopathic-spasm-and-if-you-don't-believe-that-you're-a-revisionist school, Fitzpatrick is more focused on Stalinism at the common level. How it was maintained and what its effects were. And, surprisingly, many people supported or benefited from it by filling the spaces of those "liquidated" or informing and denouncing rivals in love or work. The real fear wasn't always the KGB at 4am but a neighbor or acquaintance at work. The sad truth is that many were co-opted by the system and worked within it to support the party. Addressed is the commonly held belief then that no matter what you may have done since the revolution, if you had been born into an "enemy class" then you were in a sense marked for life. The commoness of this view is highlighted in Fitzpatricks account. the irony of this is that those who rose up to replace the liquidated were themselves given bourgeois rewards. Fitzpatrick does excellent work in guiding the reader throught the beauracratic, social and economic difficulties of the average Soviet citizen. Well researched and well written this can be read as an introduction to the era or especially as a valuable look at Stalinism from the perspective of the urban "masses". Fitzpatrick, unlike the Conquest/Pipes school, does better at facing the sad and bitter truth that the system- while terryifing for some- was held together and supported by many who benefited. Even today walking the streets of St Petersburg, you will see many in the older generation holding pictures of Stalin in a sort of reverence. The co-opting of the culture and population is, to me, the most troubling aspect and legacy of Stalinism. Everyday Stalinism could function as an interesting companion piece to Orwell's 1984. Well done.
Rating:
Summary: Everyday Stalinism.
Review: Life in Stalin's Russia must have been extremely hard for all concerned, yet Sheila Fitzpatrick has managed to create a fascinating and readable book. There is a great deal of detail based on meticulous research, but at the same time there is an awareness of ordinary people, and some humour: if you needed to invent a new life for yourself, it was best to claim that you had been born in Kiev, since their records were destroyed in the Civil War. The strongest message comes at the end, that with everything "homo sovieticus" had to endure, he/she was a survivor. As a teacher of 20th century history I can totally recommend this book to anyone, student or general reader, who wants to understand this period and these remarkable people.
Rating:
Summary: Well written and well researched
Review: Written by one of the most respected scholars of the USSR in the 1930's, Everyday Stalinism is outstanding. Fitzpatrick has exhaustively scoured recently opened Soviet archives for material in this book, and it shows. There is an abundance of new information here. Fitzpatrick details urban life in 1930's Soviet Union - the daily struggles of common men and women in extraordinary circumstances are vividly portrayed: the shortages of food and clothing, the ubiquitous presence of the government, the almost feudal arrangements between social strata (party members and others who hold "blat" - influence) and the competition for housing as the USSR began to urbanize. Only one chapter is devoted exclusively to the Great Purges of the late 1930's, although its silent presence is tangible just beneath the surface in much of the books subject matter. As one would expect from a professional historian, the books primary purpose is scholarship. But a strength is Fitzpatrick's writing style which is fluid and never dull. Be forewarned, this is not light reading. With that said, I highly recommend it to anyone who has more than a passing interest in the Soviet Union or Russia. If you want a deeper understanding of why the USSR socially and econcomically rotted from within, this is an excellent starting place.
Rating:
Summary: Well written and well researched
Review: Written by one of the most respected scholars of the USSR in the 1930's, Everyday Stalinism is outstanding. Fitzpatrick has exhaustively scoured recently opened Soviet archives for material in this book, and it shows. There is an abundance of new information here. Fitzpatrick details urban life in 1930's Soviet Union - the daily struggles of common men and women in extraordinary circumstances are vividly portrayed: the shortages of food and clothing, the ubiquitous presence of the government, the almost feudal arrangements between social strata (party members and others who hold "blat" - influence) and the competition for housing as the USSR began to urbanize. Only one chapter is devoted exclusively to the Great Purges of the late 1930's, although its silent presence is tangible just beneath the surface in much of the books subject matter. As one would expect from a professional historian, the books primary purpose is scholarship. But a strength is Fitzpatrick's writing style which is fluid and never dull. Be forewarned, this is not light reading. With that said, I highly recommend it to anyone who has more than a passing interest in the Soviet Union or Russia. If you want a deeper understanding of why the USSR socially and econcomically rotted from within, this is an excellent starting place.
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