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Young Stalin

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Young Stalin

By: Simon Sebag Montefiore
Narrated by: Sean Barrett
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About this listen

 Winner of the Costa Biography Award, 2007.

Young Stalin is a remarkable adventure story about an exceptional, turbulent young man, born in exoticism, raised in the church, fancying himself a poet, then embracing revolutionary idealism and thereby finding his romantic, Messianic mission in life.

All the roots of Stalin the Great Dictator can be traced to his youth - not merely his psychology, but his hatreds, his loves, his intellectual interests, his gangsterish murderousness, his friendships, his knowledge of the world. Above all, in the underground Bolshevik life are the seeds that grew into the paranoia and Terror of the Soviet imperium. Young Stalin is the product of major new research.

This book is the prequel to the international best-selling biography Stalin: Court of the Red Tsar.

©2007 Simon Sebag Montefiore (P)2006 Orion Publishing Group Ltd Historical Politicians Politics & Activism Politics & Government Presidents & Heads of State Russia Russian & Soviet World Stalin Soviet Union
All stars
Most relevant  
If we as a society of highly intelligent social creatures are to improve as civilisations, then we must learn why people the people they become. This is especially so for those despotic leaders we've come to despise for their deeds. This why, I believe Young Stalin is essential reading.

It is a very well written, easy to read account how Stalin evolved into a self-centred despot, as it exposes his fractured childhood by an absentee drunken, abusive father and over-protective, clinging mother which goes to somewhat explain his fear of being robbed of supreme adulation. Highly recommend this book.

What is the making of a tyrant?

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