Includes bibliographical references and index.

Front Matter / Frederick C. Corney -- Anatomy of a Polemic / Frederick C. Corney -- ‘The Lessons of October’ / L. Trotsky -- ‘Who Carried Out the October Revolution? (On the “History” of October in L. Trotsky’s Book 1917)’ / I. Stepanov -- ‘How the History of October Must not be Written (On L. Trotsky’s Book 1917)’ / N. Bukharin -- ‘The Komsomol and October (On Comrade Trotsky’s “The Lessons of October”)’ / Central Committee of Komsomol, Moscow Committee of Komsomol, Leningrad Committee of Komsomol -- ‘On the Intolerable Distortion of Historical Facts (On Comrade Trotsky’s Article “The Uprising”)’ / D. Lebed’ -- ‘How Should the History of October be Approached? (Comrade Trotsky’s “The Lessons of October”)’ / G. Sokol’nikov -- ‘On Comrade Trotsky’s “The Lessons of October”’ / N. Babakhan -- ‘Trotskyism or Leninism? Report by Comrade L.B. Kamenev’ / L. Kamenev -- ‘Trotskyism or Leninism?’ / I. Stalin -- ‘Our Differences’ / L. Trotsky -- ‘Bolshevism or Trotskyism (Where the Trotskyist Line is Leading)’ / G. Zinoviev -- ‘An Unsuccessful Depiction of the “German October” (Comrade Trotsky’s “The Lessons of October”)’ / O. Kuusinen -- ‘On the Lessons of Trotskyism (L. Trotsky’s Book Lenin)’ / V. Molotov -- The Chkheidze Controversy / Frederick C. Corney -- ‘The Question of the Lessons of October’ / N. Krupskaia -- ‘The October Revolution and the Tactics of Russian Communists’ / I. Stalin -- ‘“The Lessons of October” and the Bulgarian Communist Party’ / V. Kolarov -- ‘Letter to Comrades’ / Leopol’d Averbakh , An. Shokhin , B. Treivas , N. Pen’kov , V. Dalin , M. Fedorov , M. Dugachev , F. Deliusin and A. Bezymenskii -- ‘The Autobiography of Trotskyism’ / G. Safarov -- ‘The Theory of Permanent Revolution. An Article by Comrade A.I. Bukharin’ / N. Bukharin -- ‘To All the Members of the Central Committee Who are Enemies of Trotskyism’ (1924) / N. Bukharin -- ‘“The New Discussion”. An Article by Com. A.I. Rykov’ / A.I. Rykov -- ‘Not Every Effort is Successful’ / A. Andreev -- ‘Letter from Comrade Trotsky to the Plenum of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party (Bolshevik)’ / L. Trotsky -- ‘Resolution of the Plenums of the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party (Bolshevik) and of the Central Control Commission on the Actions of Comrade Trotsky, 17 January 1925 (Adopted by a Majority of All Members of the CC with Two against and by All Members of the CCC with One Abstention)’ / Frederick C. Corney -- ‘Mistakes in “The Lessons of October” by Comrade Trotsky’ / S.A. Piontkovskii -- ‘Lenin, Conspiratoriality, October’ / E. Kviring -- ‘The Ideological Foundations of Trotskyism’ / B. Kun -- ‘“The Lessons of October” and Trotskyism’ / A. Bubnov -- ‘The Struggle for the Party’ / S. Kanatchikov -- Introduction to ‘The Lessons of the Revolution’ / Paul Levi -- ‘The Lessons of the October Experiment’ / Karl Kautsky -- Glossary / Frederick C. Corney -- Bibliography / Frederick C. Corney -- Index / Frederick C. Corney.

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In Trotsky’s Challenge: The ‘Literary Discussion’ of 1924 and the Fight for the Bolshevik Revolution , Frederick C. Corney examines the political polemic surrounding the publication of Trotsky’s The Lessons of October . Trotsky’s analysis ran counter to the efforts of Bolshevik leaders to fashion the narrative of October as a foundation event in which the Bolshevik Party, under the clear-sighted leadership of Lenin, played a major role in bringing about a radical socialist revolution in Russia. Corney has translated into English the major contributions to this polemic, annotated them, and written an extensive contextualising introduction, examining the polemic for its impact not only on the figure of Trotsky, but also on the changing political culture of the 1920s and 1930s.