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isaac-deutscher-the-prophet-armed-trotsky-1879-1921

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THE PROPHET ARMED<br />

disguised as labourers working in <strong>the</strong> garden; but <strong>the</strong>se could<br />

only report that Shvigovsky kept serving his visitors apples and<br />

endless cups of tea and having harmless and cranky discussions<br />

with <strong>the</strong>m. 1<br />

These, we know, were years of revolutionary revival. In<br />

March 1895 <strong>the</strong> Minister of <strong>the</strong> Interior, Durnovo, wrote to<br />

Pobedonostscv that he was al<strong>armed</strong> by <strong>the</strong> new trends, especially<br />

among students who had zealously and with no expectation<br />

of reward taken to lecturing on all sorts of social <strong>the</strong>mes.<br />

In <strong>the</strong> Minister's eyes this idealistic disinterestedness augured<br />

nothing good. All <strong>the</strong> repressiye legislation of previous years<br />

had failed to make <strong>the</strong> schools and universities immune from<br />

subversive influences. For years now <strong>the</strong> ministry had been<br />

appointing professors over <strong>the</strong> heads of <strong>the</strong> faculties, dismissing<br />

suspects, and promoting obedient nonentities. Scholars of world<br />

fame such as D. Mcndclcycv, <strong>the</strong> chemist, I. Mcchnikov, <strong>the</strong><br />

biologist, and :\I. Kovalevsky, <strong>the</strong> sociologist, had been found<br />

disloyal and dismissed or forced to resign <strong>the</strong>ir chairs. The<br />

eminent historian Klyuchevsky had had to recant his liberal<br />

opinions. The works of John Stuart Mill, Herbert Spencer, and<br />

Karl Marx had been forbidden. Students' libraries and clubs<br />

had been closed; and informers had been planted in <strong>the</strong> lecture<br />

halls. Entry fees had been raised fivefold to bar academic education<br />

to children of poor parents. Yet in spite of everything<br />

resurgent rebellion stalked <strong>the</strong> universities. At <strong>the</strong> end of 1895<br />

and at <strong>the</strong> beginning of 1896 students were asked to take an<br />

oath of loyalty to <strong>the</strong> new Tsar, Nicholas II. In Petersburg,<br />

Moscow, and Kiev most students refused. The Tsar's coronation<br />

(during which thousands of onlookers were trampled upon,<br />

maimed, and killed in a stampede for which <strong>the</strong> police were<br />

blamed) was followed, in May 1896, by a strike of 30,000<br />

Petersburg workers, <strong>the</strong> first strike on this scalc. 2<br />

In <strong>the</strong>se events <strong>the</strong> influence was already felt of <strong>the</strong> Union of<br />

Struggle for <strong>the</strong> Emancipation of <strong>the</strong> Working Class recently<br />

founded by Lenin, Martov, and Potresov. The revived movement<br />

was wlwlly influenced by <strong>the</strong> :\1arxists- - <strong>the</strong> .Yarodnilcs<br />

scarcely took part in it. The new socialism relied primarily on<br />

<strong>the</strong> industrial worker. It repudiated terrorism. It recognized<br />

1<br />

G. A. Ziv, Trotsk;', Kharakteristika po Lidmym l'ospomi11anyam, p. 8.<br />

2<br />

Sibiryak, Studenchtskoye Dt'i~henie v Rosii.

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