Ida Mett

Upon their scandalous deportation from the United States in 1919, famous anarchist writers and activists Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman were greeted like heroes by the new Bolshevik government in Russia. Berkman described it as "the most sublime day of my life." And yet he would flee the country after only two years. Belarus-born Ida Mett, who went through a similar experience at the time, also wrote a harrowing account of the Red Army's brutal massacre at the Kronstadt Uprising before she too went into exile. How did each of these figures become so deeply disillusioned with Russia so quickly? And why, within a few years, did they all leave the country forever? 1917 offers a unique alternative perspective on the early years of the Russian Revolution through the narrative perspective of these three eyewitnesses. Featuring an introduction by Murray Bookchin, this book emphasizes the rarely discussed anarchist hopes for a democratic October revolution, while also critiquing the increasingly authoritarian responses of Bolshevik leaders at the time. Published for the centennial of the Russian revolutions, 1917 contains four essays by Emma Goldman, Alexander Berkman, Ida Mett, and Bookchin, as well as a poem by Dan Georgakas, that analyze, assess, celebrate, and bemoan both the wild successes and the bitter failures of the revolution.

On the eve of the 100th anniversary of the 'October Revolution', where the Bolsheviks seized control of a popular uprising, there can still be found those who celebrate the events as a victory of 'workers control'. Ida Mett's account was among the first to expose such illusions. The sailors of Kronstadt had been instrumental in aiding the Bolsheviks to power, but by 1921 they had become disillusioned with the direction that events were taking. Frustrated by worsening economic conditions and by the Bolsheviks increasingly brutal attempts at centralising power, the sailors and soldiers of Kronstadt put forward a series of demands designed to win back the control and autonomy that had been promised. The Kronstadt uprising of 1921 was one of the most important yet often overlooked events of the Russian civil war. The bloody suppression of the rebels by the 'government of the workers and peasants' marked the final blow to any hopes of a genuine popular revolution based on democratic self-management. Ida Mett dispels the myths of the Bolsheviks and provides a dramatic and engaging account of the events that made clear the true nature of the 'proletarian' dictatorship. Originally published in French in 1938, and in English by the libertarian socialist group 'Solidarity' in 1967, this contemporary account which includes documents from the actual participants has been restored and revived for the next generation of social revolutionaries.