Leon Trotsky (1879-1940) – the leader of the Russian Revolution and Stalin’s unyielding opponent – remains an immensely controversial figure seventy years after his assassination in Mexico City. In this collection of essays and lectures, David North, an authority on Soviet history, examines the disputes surrounding Trotsky’s life and ideas and explains their contemporary relevance.


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This is the text of a speech Trotsky gave before an audience of Social Democratic students in Copenhagen in 1932. It was to be the last time Trotsky was able to speak before a mass public audience. Learn More

These two lectures challenge the claims of right-wing historians that the demise of the Soviet Union proved (1) that the October Revolution was nothing more than a putsch that lacked significant popular support; (2) that any other effort to create a socialist society is doomed to failure; and (3) that the capitalist market is the only viable basis for human existence. Learn More

Raskolnikov's account of the role played by the Kronstadt sailors is an essential document of the October Revolution. Trotsky, in his own history of the revolution, made repeated references to it. A leader of the sailors, the author was 25 in 1917 and a heroic figure in his own right. This lively account was first published in 1925. Learn More

This lecture by David North is one of seven delivered to the 1998 international symposium Marxism and the Fundamental Problems of the 20th Century by the International Committee of the Fourth International in Sydney, Australia. Learn More

Contains a selection of Trotsky's speeches. Covers three periods of Trotsky's life, 1906-1917; 1917-1929 and 1929-1940. Learn More

Trotsky wrote this book in the wake of the failure of the German Communist Party to capitalize on the revolutionary opportunity present in 1923. This essay marked an important development in the struggle by Trotsky against the degeneration of the Bolshevik Party under the leadership of Stalin, Kamenev and Zinoviev. In it the Bolshevik leader examines the critical role of working class leadership in the October Revolution in Russia. Trotsky insisted that the Communist International must assimilate the lessons of the experiences of 1917 or face disaster. This book provoked a furious response by the growing bureaucracy. Learn More

Five articles by Trotsky, founder of the Red Army, written between 1921 and 1924. Learn More

Speech by Trotsky at the commemorative plenum of the Moscow Soviet, April 24, 1924 Learn More