Red Plenty - Softcover

Spufford, Francis

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0571225241 ISBN 13: 9780571225248

Publisher: Faber & Faber, 2011

Synopsis

The Soviet Union was founded on a fairytale. It was built on 20th-century magic called 'the planned economy', which was going to gush forth an abundance of good things that the penny-pinching lands of capitalism could never match. And just for a little while, in the heady years of the late 1950s, the magic seemed to be working. Red Plenty is about that moment in history, and how it came, and how it went away; about the brief era when, under the rash leadership of Nikita Khrushchev, the Soviet Union looked forward to a future of rich communists and envious capitalists, when Moscow would out-glitter Manhattan, every Lada would be better engineered than a Porsche and sputniks would lead the way to the stars. And it's about the scientists who did their genuinely brilliant best to make the dream come true, to give the tyranny its happy ending.

About this title

Review:

'Bizarre and brilliant book ... Spufford's genius is to re-create that moment as people lived it, rich in possibility, the future not yet assured ... this is like no other history book I have read ... it is hard to believe that there could be a more rigorous evocation of that brief, illusory moment when Soviet communism seemed poised to transform the world. I finished the book in awe, not just at Spufford's Stakhanovite research, but his skill as a novelist, his judgement as a historian and his sheer guts in attempting something simultaneously so weird and yet so wonderful.' --Sunday Times

'This strange, clever book blends fact and fiction to convey vast amounts of information with the light touch of the storyteller.' --Guardian

'Virtuoso storytelling in a series of vividly imagined episodes - funny, poignant, spine-chilling.' --Daily Telegraph

'An eccentric but vivid history ... seen through the eyes of imaginatively crafted fictional characters.' --The Times

'Virtuoso storytelling in a series of vividly imagined episodes - funny, poignant, spine-chilling.' -- Daily Telegraph

The book is rigorously researched and inventively conceived. --Independent on Sunday

'An eccentric but vivid history ... seen through the eyes of imaginatively crafted fictional characters.' --The Times

'Virtuoso storytelling in a series of vividly imagined episodes - funny, poignant, spine-chilling.' --Daily Telegraph

Book Description:

Red Plenty by Francis Spufford: What if the Soviet 'miracle' had worked, and the communists had discovered the secret to prosperity, progress and happiness...?

About this edition

• Publisher: Faber & Faber
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0571225241
• ISBN 13: 9780571225248
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 448