Primitive art is inseparable from primitive consciousness and can be correctly understood only with the correct socio-cultural context. This book examines the ancient art of Siberia as part of the integral whole of ancient society.

A century on, scholars can achieve a certain balance in views of what Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin’s government meant for Russia and for the world. Roberto Echaverren synthesizes all that we know about Lenin and his government by taking data from new and original sources. With auxiliary chapters on the evolution of land tenancy in Russia, the collectivization of land under Stalin, and the suppression of sexual minorities under Soviet rule, this book adds breadth and scope to our understanding of Lenin’s government and legacy.

The Soviet Communist Party faced a large-scale problem of regulating membership after the Russian Revolution of 1917. While recruitments were conducted mainly according to the internal Party rules, exclusion campaigns were periodically adopted to ensure ideological purity. In the decades before World War II, these reviews took various forms – from mere administrative re-registration to violent purges that involved millions of arrests.

When did Russia become “modern?” Historians of Russia – including even many Russian historians – have long tried to identify Russia’s “modern” moment. While most scholars have looked to economic or ideological transitions, noted historian and critic Paul du Quenoy approaches the problem through culture, and specifically the performing arts, as told through the prism of one of its leading nineteenth-century practitioners, the composer and critic Alexander Serov.

Translator:
Arch Tait, Ph.D.

A Russian Jew who spent most of his life in England and America, Alexander Bakshy (1885-1949) was a theater critic and literary translator. He was also an innovative theorist who applied to theater the discourse of self-reflexive modernism, prizing anti-illusionist medium-awareness. Indeed, he was something of a pioneer in the area of “spectatorship” and medium-awareness, going so far as to argue in favor of the modernist idea of overt presentationalism on stage as opposed to disingenuous representationalism.

Orthodox Christianity is one of the world’s major religions, and the Russian Orthodox Church is by far its largest denomination. Few know its history and spiritual richness, however. Neil Kent’s comprehensive new book fills that gap. The Russian Orthodox Church’s Eastern roots, including its dogma, canons, and practices, are explored, along with the political and military contexts in which it carried out its mission over the centuries.

In May 1945, as World War II drew to a close in Europe, some 30,000 Russian Cossacks surrendered to British forces in Austria, believing they would be spared repatriation to the Soviet Union. The fate of those among them who were Soviet citizens had been sealed by the Yalta Agreement, signed by the Allied leaders a few months earlier.

In Russia’s Military Interventions, Elnur Ismayilov analyzes Russia’s recent military interventions in Georgia and Ukraine by assessing the driving factors – the interests fueling Russian involvement and the decisions that fostered the resulting wars. Ismayilov covers the creation and transformation behind Russia’s post-Soviet perspectives on Ukraine and Georgia and explores the panorama of post-Soviet Russia’s foreign policy from the 1990s up to the turbulent present, in which Ukraine and Georgia’s pro-Western orientations have remained a core concern of the Kremlin.

"Born in Tashkent, raised in Moscow and New York City, an editor in Odessa, a correspondent in Paris, there seems nowhere Davidzon hasn't been, no one he hasn't met. The result is a distinctive voice and eye, an eclectic mix of the cultural critic, the political analyst and the liberal cosmopolitan, evident from the first page of this delightful book"
- Mark Galeotti, University College London and Royal University Services Institute