Russia

Wallace, Donald Mackenzie, 1841-1919Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.9

Word count: 1.7M words
Chapters: 170

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Russia by Donald Mackenzie WallaceAuthor: Wallace, Donald Mackenzie, 1841-1919,Language: English, Class: DK: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: Russia, Former Soviet Republics, Poland, Release Date: May 3, 2006

Editor's review

This book is a classic work on Russia by the British scholar Donald Mackenzie Wallace and one of the important late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Western texts observing Russian society and institutions. Combining historical narrative with institutional analysis, it surveys Russia's geography, peoples, political system, social structure, and religious life; its material is solid and its observations detailed, reflecting the author's long years of fieldwork and documentary research. Unlike ordinary travel accounts, the book is closer to institutional and social history, and is suited to readers who wish to understand Russia's historical depth and institutional logic. The Project Gutenberg electronic edition makes this substantial old work easily accessible again. Readers should note its period and standpoint: its judgments reflect a nineteenth-century Western observer's perspective and should be used alongside later scholarship rather than taken directly as a description of contemporary Russia.

Who it's for

A good fit for

History enthusiasts interested in Russia's historical and institutional evolution
University students taking courses in Russian history or East European studies
Readers who want to understand how nineteenth-century Westerners observed Russia
Self-learners who prefer classic historical sources and can handle long English narratives

Not a good fit for

Readers who want quick information on current events in Russia
Journalists who need the latest data and contemporary analysis
Casual readers with little patience for long historical narratives

Reading tips

Look up the author's life and the book's date of writing first to establish a historical frame of reference before starting the text.
Read by theme rather than straight through: begin with the sections on the political system and social structure, then fill in the chapters on geography and religion.
Note the author's period biases and the basis for his judgments as you read, and compare them with later scholarship.
Read alongside a modern general history of Russia to make up for the book's cutoff in the early twentieth century.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book about contemporary Russia?

No. The book was written in the late nineteenth to early twentieth century and describes the geography, institutions, and social conditions of the Russian Empire at that time. It helps in understanding Russia's historical depth but cannot be used directly to understand the realities of contemporary Russia.

Can I understand it without a background in Russian history?

Yes, but it is advisable to first review a timeline of major events in Russian history and learn basic background such as Peter the Great's reforms, serfdom, and Orthodox Christianity. The book's narrative is fairly systematic, and with basic background the obstacles to reading will be noticeably reduced.

Is the book's standpoint objective?

The book's material is detailed and its observations careful, but the author was a nineteenth-century British observer and carries the perspectives and assumptions of the Western intelligentsia of his time regarding Russia. Its judgments should be read in their historical context and cross-referenced with later scholarship.

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About the author

Wallace, Donald Mackenzie, 1841-1919 Author · British · 1841–1919

Donald Mackenzie Wallace (1841–1919) was a British scholar and writer. He devoted sustained attention to Russia, and his representative work is Russia; he also wrote several works on Russian history, politics, and literature. Wallace's writing is marked by solid observation and clear narrative, and he was adept at combining historical context with political realities and literary life, helping English-speaking readers understand Russia's social structure and cultural traditions. His works were influential in British intellectual circles in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and are often regarded as important references for understanding Russia. Public information on his early education, specific posts, and detailed career is limited, so this entry makes no conjecture and outlines his writing focus only on the basis of the library's holdings and confirmable public knowledge.