Can History be Rewritten?

The grandson of Joseph Stalin seems to think so, he's in court suing a Russian newspaper for stating that Joseph Stalin personally ordered the deaths of Soviet citizens.

It appears that there is a growing movement to rehabilitate Stalin's image. Whether or not it succeeds, remains to be seen.

To learn more about Joseph Stalin, you can borrow Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar by Simon Sebag Montefiore [947.084 MON].

From the New York Times review by Richard Pipes:

"Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar," by the British journalist and novelist Simon Sebag Montefiore, reverses this approach: it pays minimal attention to Stalin's politics and concentrates on the man and his immediate associates. This was made possible by the author's access to previously secret private documents, including Stalin's notes and messages, as well as by interviews with the surviving offspring of his closest companions. In addition, Montefiore has made an exhaustive study of the published literature. The result is the first intimate portrait of a man who had more lives on his conscience than Hitler and yet, according to opinion polls, is regarded by Russians even today as a giant, the fourth greatest human being in world history.

The The New York Times has also collected many online resources about Stalin here.

If you don't want to devote the rest of the year to Stalin (the book above is 785 pages) then perhaps you would like to borrow Stalin a docudrama originally aired on HBO [VIDEO STA].