Ivan's War: The Red Army at War 1939-45 - Softcover

Merridale, Catherine

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0571218091 ISBN 13: 9780571218097

Publisher: Faber & Faber, 2006

Synopsis

'Essential reading, not just for those interested in the Eastern Front, but for anyone who wants to understand Russia.' Antony Beevor, Sunday Times

They died in their millions, shattered by German shells and tanks, freezing behind the wire of prison camps, driven forward in suicidal charges by the secret police. Yet in all the books about the Second World War on the eastern front, there is very little about how the Russian soldier lived, dreamed and died.

Catherine Merridale's discovery of archives of letters, diaries and police reports have allowed her to write a major history of a figure too often treated as part of a vast mechanical horde. Here are moving and terrible stories of men and women in appalling conditions, many not far from death. They allow us to understand the strange mixture of courage, patriotism, anger and fear that made it possible for these badly fed, dreadfully governed soldiers to defeat the Nazi army that would otherwise have enslaved the whole of Europe. The experience of the soldiers is set against a masterly narrative of the war in Russia. Merridale also shows how the veterans were treated with chilling ingratitude and brutality by Stalin, and later exploited as icons of the Great Patriotic War before being sidelined once more in Putin's new capitalist Russia.

About this title

Review

"Unprecedented in its approach, Catherine Merridale's research into the lives of Red Army soldiers combined with her perception makes this a most fascinating and important work."
--Antony Beevor, author of "Stalingrad"
"Catherine Merridale has done something very unusual. The Soviet war effort has been described many times but her new book tells the searing story from the bottom up. Her account of the sufferings of the Red Army soldiers and their families is unlikely to be bettered."
--Robert Service, author of "Stalin: A Biography"
""
"Merridale's new book is excellent. This unique, strikingly original account of the Red Army in World War II is a first-rate social history
as well as an important military study, and a stellar example of the combination of oral history with standard archival research. It makes the
soldiers of the Red Army come alive."
--Stanley Payne, Hilldale-Jaume Vicens Vives Professor of History, University of Wisconsin-Madison ""Ivan's War" is a marvelous book. All of Catherine Merridale's virtues are on display: remarkable research (based in this case on literally hundreds of interviews with survivors and witnesses); a clear, unpretentious style that belies the complexity of her material; comfortable historical command of a dauntingly large theme; and a rare compassion and empathy for her subjects. "Ivan's War" confirms what anyone who read "Night of Stone" already knew: that Catherine Merridale is a superb historian, among the very best of her generation."
--Tony Judt, author of "Postwar: A History of ""Europe"" Since 1945"""
"This is an inventively researched and evocatively written study of the Soviet soldier on theblood-ridden Eastern Front. Using freshly available archival materials, as well as sparkling interviews with a vanishing generation of veterans, Merridale has provided an empathetic and realistic portrait of the men and women who, more than any other combat soldiers, brought down the Third Reich."
"--"Norman M. Naimark, author of "The Russians in Germany" and "Fires of Hatred"
"Catherine Merridale has picked the locks that kept this history hidden. . . . Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the history of the time."--"The Economist"
 
"[A] breathtaking, sweeping, yet well-balanced and finely tuned study."--"The Times Literary Supplement" (London)
 
"With extraordinary patience and a wonderful ear for nuance . . . [Merridale] produces what may be the best historical portrait of life in the Red Army yet published."--"The New York Review of Books"
 
"Combines, quite effectively, painstaking historical reconstruction and sympathetic projection."--"The New York Times""" "[A] profoundly empathic work of history."--"Newsday" "An impressive work of history, managing to give a sense of the amazing hardships of the frontoviki's experience."--"The New York Sun"  "Succeeds admirably in fashioning a compelling portrait, helped immensely by her talent as a writer."--"Foreign Affairs"  "[Merridale] does a

Book Description

Ivan's War: The Red Army at War 1939-45 by Catherine Merridale is a powerful and groundbreaking examination of the ordinary Russian soldier's experience of the worst war in history, on the eastern front of World War II.

About this edition

• Publisher: Faber & Faber
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 0571218091
• ISBN 13: 9780571218097
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 416