1960s-80s Soviet books (PDFs inside)

[Ismail]

In this thread myself (and hopefully others) will coordinate the scanning of Soviet works from the 1960s-80s. Since the year 1991 put them out of copyright, I think it is worth putting them online mainly because they often deal with subjects of interests to leftists in general, such as European history, questions of communist theory, biographies, etc. It is also strange that there are reams of Trot, Maoist and other tendencies' works online, and the "Stalinist" period is covered decently as well (as are Albanian works), but hardly anything from the USSR under Khrushchev and his successors.

Any such works scanned will go here: https://archive.org/search.php?query=uploader%3A%22kocotosi%40gmail.co m%22&sort=-publicdate

As you can see, I've scanned 3 such books so far, over the next few days I will scan more. My final target will be a 600-page bio of Marx from 1989. Books to scan before that include Modern History: 1640-1870, which should also be of general interest to leftists.

Anyone living near a large library is quite likely to have Soviet books in reach. The vast majority were published by Progress Publishers or the Novosti Press Agency Publishing House, some others by the "Nauka" Publishing House. There were also various Soviet books on science and educational materials translated into English which can be found here: http://mirtitles.org/

[Os Cangaceiros]

I recently bought three of these books from my local college library for 75 cents. Namely "USSR Healthcare", "USSR Agriculture" and "Safeguarding Peaceful Labor" (lol).

Most of the book's actual content is just really boring and banal propaganda of the crudest sort, mostly along the lines of "life was shitty pre-USSR, now it's great", but a lot of the photographs are interesting.

[Ismail]

I recently bought three of these books from my local college library for 75 cents. Namely "USSR Healthcare", "USSR Agriculture" and "Safeguarding Peaceful Labor" (lol).

Most of the book's actual content is just really boring and banal propaganda of the crudest sort, mostly along the lines of "life was shitty pre-USSR, now it's great", but a lot of the photographs are interesting.Obviously stuff like that was written to have English-speaking persons go "hooray USSR," and are of slight value. My books are stuff like African Problems, which is a collection of 1960s articles (one on the class content of Pan-Africanism, another on agricultural development in the newly-independent states, etc.) by prominent Soviet Africanist I.I. Potekhin.

But it is true that even these books are often written in a pretty dry prose.

[Five Year Plan]

In this thread myself (and hopefully others) will coordinate the scanning of Soviet works from the 1960s-80s. Since the year 1991 put them out of copyright, I think it is worth putting them online mainly because they often deal with subjects of interests to leftists in general, such as European history, questions of communist theory, biographies, etc. It is also strange that there are reams of Trot, Maoist and other tendencies' works online, and the "Stalinist" period is covered decently as well (as are Albanian works), but hardly anything from the USSR under Khrushchev and his successors.

Any such works scanned will go here: https://archive.org/search.php?query=uploader%3A%22kocotosi%40gmail.co m%22&sort=-publicdate

As you can see, I've scanned 3 such books so far, over the next few days I will scan more. My final target will be a 600-page bio of Marx from 1989. Books to scan before that include Modern History: 1640-1870, which should also be of general interest to leftists.

Anyone living near a large library is quite likely to have Soviet books in reach. The vast majority were published by Progress Publishers or the Novosti Press Agency Publishing House, some others by the "Nauka" Publishing House. There were also various Soviet books on science and educational materials translated into English which can be found here: http://mirtitles.org/

I've actually been interested in reading the book Modern History. When do you think you will have it scanned?

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

I'm normally so critical of Ismail, but to be fair this is of huge historical interest. Appreciate the effort.

[Ismail]

I've actually been interested in reading the book Modern History. When do you think you will have it scanned?The next few days, as I said. It's some 350 pages in length and some of the chapter titles are "Spain in the Late 17th and Early 18th Centuries," "The Revolution of 1848-1849 in France," "Latin America from 1500 to 1870," etc. It was apparently a textbook used in Soviet schools and contains a few maps in color such as "Revolution and the Revolutionary Movement in Europe 1848-1849" although I doubt the binding will allow me to scan said maps in enough detail. The preface mentions that it's part of a series titled "Student's Library" alongside other books that weren't translated into English, such as a history of Asia and Africa, a history of the Americas, etc.

Eastern European educational texts seemed somewhat interesting. Here's the first chapter from an East German civics textbook: http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/sbk.htm

I'm going to try scanning Lenin and National Liberation in the East next, a 1978 book that's mostly about the impact of October Revolution in places like Mongolia, Turkey, Burma, etc. and how the nascent Soviet state interacted with them.

[Ismail]

Now that I've scanned Lenin and National Liberation in the East, these are the books I'll scan next (top = first, bottom = last):

* The Socialist International
* Socialism and the Newly Independent Nations
* Modern History: 1640-1870
* African Problems: Analysis of Eminent Soviet Scientist
* Agrarian Reforms and Hired Labour in Africa
* Peace and Security for the Peoples (a collection of 1975-1984 speeches by Todor Zhivkov, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Bulgaria, not strictly speaking "Soviet" but just as well)
* Karl Marx: A Biography
* Questions of the Socialist Organisation of the Economy (compilation of stuff from Lenin's Collected Works)
* Lenin on the United States of America (another Lenin compilation, also contains some minor stuff not in his Collected Works, nearly 700 pages)
* Meeting of Representatives of the Parties and Movements Participating in the Celebration of the 70th Anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution
* Frederick Engels: A Short Biography

The last two are there because the bindings are tight enough to potentially make scanning a bit of a pain. I also might buy another Soviet book or two later this month.

[Five Year Plan]

The next few days, as I said. It's some 350 pages in length and some of the chapter titles are "Spain in the Late 17th and Early 18th Centuries," "The Revolution of 1848-1849 in France," "Latin America from 1500 to 1870," etc. It was apparently a textbook used in Soviet schools and contains a few maps in color such as "Revolution and the Revolutionary Movement in Europe 1848-1849" although I doubt the binding will allow me to scan said maps in enough detail. The preface mentions that it's part of a series titled "Student's Library" alongside other books that weren't translated into English, such as a history of Asia and Africa, a history of the Americas, etc.

Eastern European educational texts seemed somewhat interesting. Here's the first chapter from an East German civics textbook: http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/sbk.htm

I'm going to try scanning Lenin and National Liberation in the East next, a 1978 book that's mostly about the impact of October Revolution in places like Mongolia, Turkey, Burma, etc. and how the nascent Soviet state interacted with them.

Just checked for that World History book at the link you provided. It's still not up there. Do you have a time frame on when you expect the book to be posted?

[Ismail]

By the 27th. I'll start scanning Socialism and the Newly Independent Nations in an hour and it'll take a few more hours for archive.org to put it online and on the list of books. The next in line for me to scan is the book you want.

[Bolshevik Sickle]

You are definitely the most helpful and educational user in the site!
Definetely a major asset to the site.

[Ismail]

One book I'll be adding to my list (to be scanned before Lenin on the United States of America) is Lenin's Impact on the United States, which was published by New World Review Publications in 1970. Since NWR was associated with the CPUSA I asked its leader, Sam Webb, if I could scan it. He said yes.

It's not much longer than 200 pages but among other things it has a whole bunch of other American leftists (like Debs and Keller), businessmen, journalists, etc. writing about how glorious Lenin was, a Soviet article on how Lenin's letter to American workers (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/aug/20.htm) actually reached them, another Soviet article on how American workers sent a letter to Lenin via a Soviet ship docked in Seattle in January 1918 (and how the local authorities reacted to workers being excited at the presence of the ship with its red banner), a CPUSA writer on Lenin's impact on American philosophers, etc.

An excerpt, pages 70-71, citing Moscow News, November 28, 1964:

Armand J. Hammer, a multimillionaire corporation head, was one of the first US capitalists to carry on negotiations with Lenin for trade between the US and USSR. He first came to the Soviet Union in 1920 as representative of the American Amalgamated Drug and Chemical Corporation. Between 1925 and 1930, he headed the corporation's concession in the USSR, which manufactured stationery. The occasion for the following story was a visit to Moscow in November 1964, with a group of US businessmen, to explore the possibility of increasing trade between the United States and the Soviet Union.

One day during the conference the US businessmen visited Lenin's museum flat in the Kremlin. In Lenin's study the guide described all the objects, which have been preserved exactly as when Lenin was alive, and while enumerating the articles on Lenin's desk displayed a sculpture of a bronze monkey. "This sculpture," the guide said, "was a gift to Lenin from an American called Hammer in the early twenties." There was a movement among the Americans and somebody exclaimed: "Could it be our Armand Hammer?" At that moment Mr. Armand Hammer elbowed his way through the crowd and said:

"Yes, I sat there with Lenin in 1921, and I gave him this monkey."

Next day Mr. Armand Hammer, President of Occidental Petroleum, told the story of the bronze monkey. "I first visited Russia in 1920," he said, "It was then that I had the luck to meet Lenin. Next year on my way to Russia I was passing through London and in a shop window I saw this monkey sitting on several volumes of Darwin. I knew that Lenin was fond of sculpture, and I thought that this would intrigue him. When I presented him with the sculpture he was delighted and his eyes sparkled. Then I asked him about the symbolism of the sculpture, emphasizing, as it did, the correctness of Darwin's theory. Lenin thought for a second and then said: 'Yes, but there is another sense too. If they don't stop arming themselves, the time may come when only monkeys remain in the world.'"

"Even then," Mr. Hammer continued, "Lenin was thinking of peaceful coexistence."

Also I'm scanning the Soviet Marx bio tomorrow.

[Ismail]

I scanned On Culture and Cultural Revolution, a compilation of Lenin's writings on the subject. It can be found in the link in the first post.

Tomorrow I will scan two more Lenin compilations: On Workers' Control and the Nationalisation of Industry, and Questions of the Socialist Organisation of the Economy.

[Ismail]

Since I last posted the following three Soviet works have been scanned:
* Patrice Lumumba (a Soviet pamphlet on his life)
* Frederick Engels: A Short Biography
* International Working-Class and Communist Movement. Historical Record (1830s to mid-1940s)

Credit goes to Wonton Carter for buying and sending the last book to me.