#V. I. Lenin

[damnesdelamer]

A “revolutionary struggle against the war” is merely an empty and meaningless exclamation [...] unless it means revolutionary action against one’s own government even in wartime. One has only to do some thinking in order to understand this. Wartime revolutionary action against one’s own government indubitably means, not only desiring its defeat, but really facilitating such a defeat. ("Discerning reader”: note that this does not mean “blowing up bridges”...)

~ V.I. Lenin

[espejomonastico]

Dmitri Shostakóvich: Sinfonía no. 12 (El Año 1917) en re menor, op. 112 (1961). «En memoria de Vladímir Ílich Lenin», en la dedicatoria del propio compositor.

Valery Gergiev, director

Orquesta y Coro del Teatro de Mariinsky

La Sinfonía no. 12 es uno de los últimos grandes intentos formales de Shostakóvich por apaciguar sus relaciones con el Partido Comunista luego de la muerte de Stalin. Hacia el año 1960, el compositor trabajaba en un poema sinfónico en honor a Lenin que había generado una cuota de expectativa en el marco de la reivindicación de la figura del líder soviético y ad portas del proceso de desestalinización. Anoche pude escuchar esta pieza en vivo (¿quizás estreno en mi país?).

Había logrado leer la partitura antes y siempre me llamaron la atención dos cosas. Por un lado, la austeridad formal con la que Shostakóvich logró desarrollar casi 40 minutos de música, puesto que, en rigor, el compositor despliega realmente solo dos grandes motivos a lo largo de la obra; y, en segundo lugar, el último movimiento de este flujo continuo de música, al cual Shostakóvich tituló El amanecer de la humanidad.

Hacia la resolución de dicho movimiento, los violines interpretan un ostinato sobre el acorde de re mayor que usualmente coquetea con la adición de la cuarta aumentada (sol sostenido) y la trecena/sexta disminuida (si bemol). El flujo armónico del final oscila entre el re mayor (relativo mayor de la tonalidad original de la partitura) y una alteración de mi bemol menor (tonalidad contigua a re mayor, pero muy lejana armónicamente). Al llegar al trino final de la orquesta, las cuerdas abordan rápidamente las notas correspondientes a dos acordes separados por un semitono: re mayor y mi bemol (mayor en esta ocasión). De esta manera, el auditor no logra identificar si el centro tonal es uno o el otro.

Veo en este gesto un esfuerzo de Shostakóvich por mostrar el alcance de lo posible en esta humanidad, pero manteniendo el escepticismo propio de alguien que ve la potencia de algo que aún no ha comenzado y la agitación que pueden generar las batientes alas de una bestia dormida. La coda final de la no. 12 es ciertamente gloriosa, pero también aterradora, violenta e incierta. Esta sinfonía ha sido vista como un trabajo menor en el repertorio sinfónico de Shostakóvich, pero a mí me resulta alucinante su capacidad para representar la eclosión de la crisálida revolucionaria. Shostakóvich sabe que no hay vuelta después de 1917, que la revolución puede acercar la distancia entre la Tierra y el cosmos, pero también es consciente de sus incertezas y de los costos humanos y simbólicos que ha costado. Él es hijo de la frustrada potencia creadora del comunismo que creyó inventar un hombre nuevo.

[salvarelsmots]

"Les vagues ensenyen als treballadors a unir-se, els mostren que tan sols junts poden lluitar contra els capitalistes, els ensenyen a pensar en la lluita de tota la classe obrera contra tota la classe dels fabricants i contra el govern autocràtic i policial. Per això, els socialistes anomenen les vagues "escola de guerra". Una escola en què els obrers aprenen a fer la guerra als seus enemics per l'alliberament de tot el poble i de tots els treballadors, de l'opressió dels funcionaris i de l'opressió del capital."

V. I. Lenin a "Sobre les vagues".

[listen-to-the-inner-walrus]

Personally, I think if you describe yourself as a socialist and also have a bust of Vladimir Lenin's head in your house, I should be allowed to smash that bust over your head with no consequences.

[txttletale]

what’s the difference between Marxism and Marxism-leninism

lenin, mostly

[andromerot]

started reading deathless btw um. i dont like it

[czerwonykasztelanic]

But the policy of the tsarist government in China is not only a mockery of the interests of the people—its aim is to corrupt the political consciousness of the masses. Governments that maintain themselves in power only by means of the bayonet, that have constantly to restrain or suppress the indignation of the people, have long realised the truism that popular discontent can never be removed and that it is necessary to divert the discontent from the government to some other object. For example, hostility is being stirred up against the Jews; the gutter press carries on Jew-baiting campaigns, as if the Jewish workers do not suffer in exactly the same way as the Russian workers from the oppression of capital and the police government. At the present time, the press is conducting a campaign against the Chinese; it is howling about the savage yellow race and its hostility towards civilisation, about Russia’s tasks of enlightenment, about the enthusiasm with which the Russian soldiers go into battle, etc., etc. Journalists who crawl on their bellies before the government and the money-bags are straining every nerve to rouse the hatred of the people against China. But the Chinese people have at no time and in no way oppressed the Russian people.

V. I. Lenin, The War in China, December 1900

Two points: first, Lenin's earlier writing is particularly interesting because you can follow the trajectory of his political evolution, as dictated by changing conditions and unfolding events; second, this was published over a century ago - the fear-mongering journalists are alive and well

[connorthemaoist]

We must not depict socialism as if socialists will bring it to us on a plate all nicely dressed. That will never happen. Not a single problem of the class struggle has ever been solved in history except by violence. When violence is exercised by the working people, by the mass of exploited against the exploiters—then we are for it! And we are not in the least disturbed by the howls of those people who consciously or unconsciously side with the bourgeoisie, or who are so frightened by them, so oppressed by their rule, that they have been flung into consternation at the sight of this unprecedentedly acute class struggle, have burst into tears, forgotten all their premises and demand that we perform the impossible, that we socialists achieve complete victory without fighting against the exploiters and without suppressing their resistance. -V. I. Lenin, 1918

[mesetacadre]

But in order that working men may succeed in this more often, every effort must be made to raise the level of the consciousness of the workers in general; it is necessary that the workers do not confine themselves to the artificially restricted limits of “literature for workers” but that they learn to an increasing degree to master general literature. It would be even truer to say “are not confined”, instead of “do not confine themselves”, because the workers themselves wish to read and do read all that is written for the intelligentsia, and only a few (bad) intellectuals believe that it is enough “for workers” to be told a few things about factory conditions and to have repeated to them over and over again what has long been known.

What is to be Done, V. I. Lenin, (1902)

[todaysdocument]

Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov signs the German-Soviet non-aggression pact; Joachim von Ribbentrop and Josef Stalin stand behind him, Moscow, August 23. 1939. Von Ribbentrop Collection.

Record Group 242: National Archives Collection of Foreign Records SeizedSeries: Copy Prints and Negatives Made from Photographs in the Ribbentrop Albums

This photograph shows Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Mikhaylovich Molotov sitting at a desk signing papers, while another man leans over the desk holding more papers.  Five men stand behind them, most notably German diplomat Joachim von Ribbentrop in a black suit and Soviet premier Josef Stalin in his usual peasant shirt.  A portrait of V. I. Lenin is on the wall behind them.

[pattern-recognition]

Take a concrete example. Can a Great-Russian Marxist accept the slogan of national, Great-Russian, culture? No, he cannot. Anyone who does that should stand in the ranks of the nationalists, not of the Marxists. Our task is to fight the dominant, Black-Hundred and bourgeois national culture of the Great Russians, and to develop, exclusively in the internationalist spirit and in the closest alliance with the workers of other countries, the rudiments also existing in the history of our democratic and working-class movement. Fight your own Great-Russian landlords and bourgeoisie, fight their ‘culture’ in the name of internationalism, and, in so fighting, ‘adapt’ yourself to the special features of the Purishkeviches and Struves – that is your task, not preaching or tolerating the Slogan of national culture.

The same applies to the most oppressed and persecuted nation – the Jews. Jewish national culture is the slogan of the rabbis and the bourgeoisie, the slogan of our enemies. But there are other elements in Jewish culture and in Jewish history as a whole. Of the ten and a half million Jews in the world, somewhat over a half live in Galicia and Russia, backward and semi-barbarous countries, where the Jews are forcibly kept in the status of a caste. The other half lives in the civilised world, and there the Jews do not live as a segregated caste. There the great world-progressive features of Jewish culture stand clearly revealed: its internationalism, its identification with the advanced movements of the epoch (the percentage of Jews in the democratic and proletarian movements is everywhere higher than the percentage of Jews among the population).

Whoever, directly or indirectly, puts forward the slogan of Jewish ‘national culture’ is (whatever his good intentions may be) an enemy of the proletariat, a supporter of all that is outmoded and connected with caste among the Jewish people; he is an accomplice of the rabbis and the bourgeoisie. On the other hand, those Jewish Marxists who mingle with the Russian, Lithuanian, Ukrainian and other workers in international Marxist organisations, and make their contribution (both in Russian and in Yiddish) towards creating the international culture of the working-class movement – those Jews, despite the separatism of the Bund, uphold the best traditions of Jewry by fighting the slogan of ‘national culture’.

Bourgeois nationalism and proletarian internationalism – these are the two irreconcilably hostile slogans that correspond to the two great class camps throughout the capitalist world, and express the two policies (nay, the two world outlooks) in the national question. In advocating the slogan of national culture and building up on it an entire plan and practical programme of what they call ‘cultural-national autonomy’, the Bundists are in effect instruments of bourgeois nationalism among the workers.

Lenin, V. I., Critical Remarks on the National Question (1913)

[sovietpostcards]

Large poster of Vladimir Lenin

Art by V. Kononov. The title reads "Only the Soviet Union is capable of actually providing the equality of nations."

Published in 1987, in good condition.

Size 68 × 95 cm (26.8" × 37")

Price $25 + $16 shipping (will be shipped rolled in tube)

Message me! Other items in my shop. I combine shipping. How to buy.

[salvarelsmots]

Tanmateix, el socialisme original era un socialisme utòpic. Criticava la societat capitalista, la condemnava, la maleïa, somiava a destruir-la, fantasiejava amb un sistema millor i volia convèncer els rics de la immortalitat de l'explotació.

No obstant això, el socialisme utòpic no podia indicar una sortida real. No sabia explicar l'essència de l'esclavitud assalariada sota el capitalisme ni descobrir-ne les lleis del desenvolupament ni trobar la força social capaç d'esdevenir la creadora d'una nova societat.

V. I. Lenin a "Les tres fonts i les tres parts constituents del marxisme".

[txttletale]

Supporting family abolition is great, but it seems weird to see an ML pushing it? Like, Lenin's changes to marriage were cool, but it seems like you're in favour of the full Marx+Engels position and that seems inconsistent.

"I support abolishing all these hierarchies... except for the biggest one most capable of controlling your life. That one I support whole-heartedly." just seems like a bizarre position to take?

leaving aside that 'the full marx + engels position' v. much endorses the DoTP -- the seeming contradiction vanishes once you realize that as a marxist-leninist i don't oppose or endorse abstract concepts like 'hierarchies' or 'power'. the exercise of control over children and women for the purpose of capitalist property management and social reproduction (the family) is bad--the exercise of control over the bourgeoise class for the purpose of seizing and maintaining control of the means of production (the revolution and its continuation in the form of the dotp) are good. 'authority' as an abstract concept has no valence whatsoever to me--the question that matters is 'whose authority, over whom, to do what?'

[gregor-samsung]

“ La democrazia non si identifica con la sottomissione della minoranza alla maggioranza. La democrazia è uno Stato che riconosce la sottomissione della minoranza alla maggioranza, cioè l'organizzazione della violenza sistematicamente esercitata da una classe contro un'altra, da una parte della popolazione contro l'altra. Noi ci assegniamo come scopo finale la soppressione dello Stato, cioè di ogni violenza organizzata e sistematica, di ogni violenza esercitata contro gli uomini in generale. Noi non auspichiamo l'avvento di un ordinamento sociale in cui non venga applicato il principio della sottomissione della minoranza alla maggioranza. Ma, aspirando al socialismo, abbiamo la convinzione che esso si trasformerà in comunismo, e che scomparirà quindi ogni necessità di ricorrere in generale alla violenza contro gli uomini, alla sottomissione di un uomo a un altro, di una parte della popolazione a un'altra, perché gli uomini si abitueranno a osservare le condizioni elementari della convivenza sociale senza violenza e senza sottomissione. Per mettere in risalto quest'elemento di consuetudine, Engels parla della nuova generazione, « cresciuta in condizioni sociali nuove, libere » e che sarà « in grado di scrollarsi dalle spalle tutto il ciarpame statale », ogni forma di Stato, compresa la repubblica democratica. Per chiarire questo punto dobbiamo analizzare le basi economiche dell'estinzione dello Stato. “

V. I. Lenin, La Comune di Parigi, a cura di Enzo Santarelli, Editori Riuniti (collana Le idee n° 59), 1971¹; p. 131. [Corsivi dell’autore]

 NOTA: Il brano proviene in origine da Stato e rivoluzione, opuscolo di Lenin scritto nell'agosto-settembre del 1917 e pubblicato in Italia a cura di Valentino Gerratana nel 1966 sempre per gli Editori Riuniti.

[thepopculturearchivist]

In 1924, V. I. Lenin died on January 21, and Woodrow Wilson died on February 3. Five years earlier they were, arguably, the two most important men in the world. The March 15, 1924 edition of THE LIVING AGE collected international impressions of both men.