Red Famine
Red Famine
Anne Applebaum
Garry Kasparov
It would be nice if people were reading it for history instead of current events! - Garry Kasparov
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Red Famine

Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine

Anne Applebaum
By
Anne Applebaum
4.4
7865
ratings on Goodreads

In "Red Famine," Pulitzer Prize-winning author Anne Applebaum delves into one of the 20th century's darkest chapters: the Ukrainian famine of 1932-33, which claimed nearly four million lives through deliberate starvation. Drawing on an expansive trove of archival documents and eyewitness accounts, newly accessible after the Soviet Union's dissolution, Applebaum meticulously reconstructs the catastrophe's genesis, execution, and harrowing aftermath. Her narrative not only uncovers the mechanisms of a state-driven tragedy but also illuminates the indomitable spirit of the Ukrainian people, who faced unimaginable horrors with resilience and courage. With scholarly rigor and narrative finesse, Applebaum exposes the Soviet regime's ruthless tactics of propaganda and terror, designed to suppress Ukraine's national identity and erase its cultural memory. "Red Famine" transcends mere historical account; it is a poignant testament to human endurance and a clarion call to remember the victims of a largely untold genocide. In a time when the echoes of the past reverberate in contemporary geopolitics, Applebaum's work serves as a sobering reminder of the lengths to which totalitarian regimes will go to consolidate power, and the vital importance of safeguarding truth and memory against the corrosive forces of denial and forgetfulness.

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Released
2017
7 Sep
Length
496
Pages

1

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It would be nice if people were reading it for history instead of current events! - Garry Kasparov
The archival record backs up the testimony of the survivors. Neither crop failure nor bad weather caused the famine in Ukraine. Although the chaos of collectivization helped create the conditions that led to famine, the high numbers of deaths in Ukraine between 1932 and 1934, and especially the spike in the spring of 1933, were not caused directly by collectivization either. Starvation was the result, rather, of the forcible removal of food from people’s homes; the roadblocks that prevented peasants from seeking work or food; the harsh rules of the blacklists imposed on farms and villages; the restrictions on barter and trade; and the vicious propaganda campaign designed to persuade Ukrainians to watch, unmoved, as their neighbours died of hunger.
— Anne Applebaum, Red Famine

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