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Menshevik Origins: The Letters of Fedor Dan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

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Review Essays
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Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1986

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References

1. On Dan's character see Boris Sapir, “Theodore Dan und sein letztes Buch,” introduction to Dan, F. I., Urspriinge des Bolschevismus: Zur Geschichte der demokratischen und socialistischen Ideen in Russland nach der Bauernbefreiung, trans. Schwarzschild, Agnes (Hannover: J.H.W. Dietz, 1968), pp. 918 Google Scholar; Dvinov, B. L., “F. I. Dan” in Martov i ego blizkie: Sbornik, with contributions by Aronson, G. Ia., Dan, L. O., Dvinov, B. L., Sapir, B. M. (New York, 1959), pp. 119–137 Google Scholar; L. O. Dan, interviews[in Russian] with L. H. Haimson, nos. 1–24, 13 May 1960–10 June 1962, Inter-University Project onthe History of the Menshevik Movement, Menshevik Project Archives, Columbia University.

2. Lenin to Axelrod, 3 May 1902, in Lenin, V. I., Polnoe sobranie sochinenii, 5th ed. (Moscow: Izdanie politicheskoi literatury, 1964, p. 182 Google Scholar refers to Dan as “nasha nadezhda.” Lenin's surprise iscited by D. Anin, “F. I. Dan,” Unser Stimme, 9–10 February 1947. In fact, in the memoirs of theright-wing Menshevik Peter Garvi, whom Anin is citing as a source, the quotation is attributed toKrupskaia. Garvi, P. A., Vospominaniia sotsial demokrata: Stat'i o zhizni i deiatel'nosti P. A. Garvi (New York: Fond po izdaniiu literaturnogo nasledstva P. A. Garvi, 1946), p. 422 Google Scholar.

3. A cartoon by Lepeshinskii dating from 1904 reads, “One of our leading mice [Dan] is the torncat's [Lenin's] namesake [Il'ich] and is mighty proud of this.” Reproduced from Letopis” revoliutsii (Berlin-Petersburg [sic]-Moscow, 1923) I: 153–155 in Israel, Gatzler, Martov: A Political Biography of a Russian Social Democrat (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; Melbourne University Press, 1967), p. 92 Google Scholar. Elsewhere, Lepeshinskii refers to Dan as “the smart Menshevik Talleyrand,” “Partiinaialikhoradka 20 let tomu nazad,” Proletarskaia revoliutsiia 2, no. 25 (1924): 27. On “Our Il'ich” seeR. Abramovitch's letter to F. Adler, 1 November 1934, LSI Archives 2623, 1.I.S.H., and S. Ivanovich (Portugeis) to S. Ingerman, 16 July 1928, Nicolaevsky Collection 23, Hoover Archives.

4. Dan's maneuvers in subverting a Bundist initiative for a party congress in favor of a meeting dominated by centralizers from the Iskra group, which would go down in history as the SecondCongress of the RSDRP, are described in Dan's letter to Lenin, dated 28 March-10 April 1902, pp.50–55 of the volume under review. It might be noted that Dan always remained proud of the fact thatit was he who brought into Russia (in the false bottom of a suitcase) the first copies of Lenin's What Is to Be Done? Theodore, Dan, The Origins of Bolshevism, ed. and trans. Carmichael, Joel (New York: Harper and Row, 1964) p. 235 Google Scholar, originally published as Proiskhozhdenie bol'shevizma: K istorii demokraticheskikh idei v Rossiiposle osvobozhdeniia krest'ian (New York: Izd. “Novaia Demokratiia,” 1946).

5. See Ek. Kuskava “Fedor Il'ich Dan,” Novoe russkoe slovo, 5 February 1947, and N. V. Valentinov (Vol'skii), “Du boukharinisme au stalinisme,” Le contrat social 7 (March-April 1963), pp. 69–78.

6. It has been suggested that Dan was “repelled by Bolshevism chiefly because of its amoralism,” “A Note on Theodore Dan,” in The Origins of Bolshevism, p. vii. Presumably, the note is written bythe translator, Joel Carmichael, or perhaps by the author of the preface, Leonard Schapiro. Certainly, Dan himself, unlike other Mensheviks, never explained his adherence to Menshevism in moral terms.

7. Sapir argues plausibly, here and particularly in his earlier article, “Theodor Dan und seinletztes Buch,” p. 17, that Dan's attitude after 1917 was guided by guilt and regret at having divergedfrom Martov during the revolution. Quite rightly, however, Sapir no longer takes at face value Dan's statement that 1917 was the first and last time that these two Menshevik leaders diverged. In light oftheir political intimacy and their family ties (Dan was married to Martov's favorite sister, Lidia Ossipovna Tsederbaum) it is surprising to note that Dan addresses Martov as “Vy” in the letterspublished here.

8. L. O. Dan. interview no. 22, 8 April 1962. One is reminded of Lenin's bon mot about German workers who would queue up to buy platform tickets before launching the revolution.

9. G. O. Bienstock to K. Kautsky, 3 May 1929, Kautsky Archives G. 16, 1.I.S.H.

10. In 1907 Maxim Gorky remarked that “little Theodore Dan spoke like a man whose relationship to the authentic truth was that of father to daughter,” cited in Bertram, Wolfe, Three Who Made a Revolution: A Biographical History (New York: Dial Press, 1948) p. 386 Google Scholar. Pitrim Sorokin, the futureHarvard sociologist and, in 1917, socialist revolutionary and secretary to Kerensky, described Dan as “a Jewish surgeon who knows his specialty about as well as I know the simple principles of medicine[and] is convinced that he is one of the cleverest of politicians. If you mix together all average Marxians, undersized, fat-minded, and deficient in clear thought and add to the mixture the wholecollection of socialist mottoes and slogans you will have Dan.” Leaves from a Russian Diary (NewYork: E. P. Dutton, 1924), p. 36.

11. Koralnik, A., “Illich—der getreier: de F.I. Dan, der serzijahrigen,” Der Tag (New York), 15 November 1931Google Scholar.

12. See, for example, V. Aleksandrova's letter to F. Dan, 24 October 1941, L. O. Dan, Archive VII/26, 1.I.S.H.

13. Sapir's best known publication is his Vpered! 1873–1877: From the Archives of Valerian Nikolaevich Smirnov. Edited, annotated and with an outline of the history of Vpered by Boris Sapir, 2 vols. (Dordrecht: Reidel, 1970). For a biographical article and interview on the occasionof the bestowal on Sapir of an honorary doctorate from the University of Amsterdam, seeMarc Jansen, “Ideen zijn blijkbaar niet definitief te daden,” NRC Handelsblad, 5 January 1985.

14. P. Axelrod to I. Tsereteli, 26 April 1926, Nicolaevsky Collection 15, Hoover Archives.

15. See Sapir's preface to the volume under review, p. xiii. In his curatorial capacity too Sapir is, in a sense, continuing the work of Nikolaevskii who directed the I.I.S.H.'s Paris officein the 1930s.

16. See p. 318 in the volume under review. The classic statement of the “Martov Line” isprobably L.M. [Martov], “Po povodu pis'ma tov. P.B. Aksel'roda,” Sotsialisticheskii Vestnik 8, 20 May 1921.

17. On the evolution of Menshevik ideas in this period see Andre, Liebich, “La critica menscevicaalia costruzione dell URSS e alio stalinismo,” in Hobsbawm, E. J. et al., eds., Storia del Marxismo (Turin: Einaudi, 1981) 3 (2): 139162 Google Scholar.

18. Sapir, commenting on Dan's letter to S. E. Estrin, 19 February 1940, suggests that Dallin withdrew from the foreign delegation because of his physical absence from France where the foreign delegation had taken refuge in 1933, see Last Mensheviks, p. 517, no. 9.Dallin's letters to R. Abramovitch, dated 8 August 1931, 11 May 1934, and 3 January 1936, Abramovitch Archives 1/1, II/l, IV/1, I.I.S.H. (the last letter is also addressed to Nikolaevskii), suggest that Dallin withdrew out of discouragement with émigré politics and with the evolution of the Soviet Union.

19. The new members of the foreign delegation were P. A. Garvi, Iu. P. Denicke, and D. Iu.Dallin. They were joined a year later by Sapir. See p. 530 of Last Menshseviks.

20. Three Mensheviks were especially important in this respect: Rafael Abramovitch (1881–1963), prominent in Jewish labor circles in New York; his importance was sometimes telescoped backwards, as by W. H. Chamberlin in a review of Abramovitch's, The Soviet Revolution (New Leader, 25 June1962) where Chamberlin speaks of Martov, Dan, and Abramovitch as the most important Mensheviksof 1903. David Dallin (1889–1962), associate editor of the New Leader, author of hundreds of articlesand of twelve books on Soviet policy published in English, some of which were considered authoritativeor path-breaking in their day. Boris Nikolaevskii (1887–1965), historian and archivist, describedas “the fairy godfather of students of the Russian revolutionary movement” (Getzler, Martov, VII)and as” … without doubt the greatest authority in the world on Soviet politics … He is our master, the master Kremlinologist” (Louis Fischer, New York Times Book Review, 21 November 1965). Rabinowitch, A., Foreword, Revolution and Politics in Russia: Essays in Memory of B.I. Nicolaevsky ed. by Alexander, and Rabinowitch, Janet with Kristof, Ladis K. D. (Bloomington and London, IndianaUniversity Press, 1972)Google Scholar quotes similar tributes from A. Dallin, George Kennan, Schapiro, and RobertC. Tucker.

21. Haimson, Leopold H., Preface, The Mensheviks from the Revolution of 1917 to the Second World War, with contributions by Dallin, David, Denicke, George, Lande, Leo, Sapir, Boris and Wolin, Simon, trans, by Vakar, Gertrude (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974), p. xl Google Scholar.For a vigorous rejection of the effort of the right Mensheviks to read back the correctness oftheir position, that is, to justify their position of the 1920s as having anticipated later events, see S. M. Schwarz's contribution to the “Obsuzhdenie raboty S. Iu. Volina, VI i VII glavy,” atranscript of a discussion held under the auspices of the Inter-University Project on the Historyof Menshevism, n.d. (available at the Harriman Institute, Columbia Univeristy). SolomonSchwarz was the last member of the foreign delegation to break ranks with Dan in 1940. Incontrast to his attitude towards the other members of the new Menshevik majority Dan does notseem to have borne Schwarz a grudge. See Dan's letter to S. E. Estrin, 10 April 1940, p. 522 of Last Mensheviks.

22. B. M. Sapir, “Bol'shevism i men'shevizm (Po povodu knigi F. I. Dana': “Proiskhozhdeniebol'shevizma’),” Sotsialisticheskii Vestnik 587/8, 20 August 1946.

23. See Marc Jansen's interview in NRC Handelsblad.

24. Such an attitude is already evident in Sapir's reaction to L. H. Haimson's preface to Schwarz's, Solomon The Russian Revolution of 1905: The Workers’ Movement and the Formation of Bolshevism and Menshevism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press and Hoover Institution, 1967)Google Scholar. B. M. Sapir to L. H. Haimson, 24 September 1967, Menshevik Project Archives, Columbia University.