Joshua Muravchik

Outstanding. Covers distinct episodes of socialist history: Babeuf / French Revolution, Owens / Utopia, Marx/Engels, Russian, Labor party /England, Unions/US, Russian and Chinese paths in the 90s, Brit Labor in the 90s. Threaded throughout most of the stories is the purist left / socialist / communist true believers contrasted with the practical and reforming types.

I bought this book over a decade ago, but never felt like reading it. Somehow I look at it and think "textbook". My mistake.

This is one of the better histories of socialism. I like his method of telling the history through short biographies of major players. Each chapter corresponds to one or two actors who exemplify that period.

Maravchik's grandparents were members of the Socialist Revolutionaries in Tsarist Russia, which was one of the more radical and terror-oriented groups working in Russia prior to Lenin's takeover. This book is a collection of brief biographies of the most important socialists, from the early Babeuf, Own, Engels, Marx, and Bernstein, Lenin, Mussolini's fascist heretic, and the modern Deng, Gorbachev and others.

Excelent overview.