Contenu du sommaire

Wladimir Berelowitch, The revolutionary movement in Russian gymnasia from the end of the nineteenth century to 1925. This article recounts the history of the revolutionary political movements among the pupils of Russian secondary schools which started at the end of the nineteenth century with the appearance of the first kruzhki and continued until 1925, when all political life other than communist was banned from these schools. This article defines the problem of continuities within the trend of this evolution (persistence of an "underground" subculture, "decadent fashion", etc.) and that of its ruptures. The 1905 revolution discloses a movement which is new in its inspiration and unity. The 1917 revolution sets forth a differentiation and a will to replay the scenario of 1905. It culminates in the dissolution of the school in which Bolshevik pupils will endeavor to play their parts.

Hugh Ragsdale, Montmorin and Catherine's Greek Project: revolution in French foreign policy. On the eve of the Revolution, the traditional French foreign policy of the "barrier in the East" was crumbling as rapidly as - and because of - the decline of French financial and military might. In 1787, the Comte de Montmorin subjected French policy to a critical reappraisal and made in St. Petersburg a radical proposal of alliance, "mime aux dépens des Turcs." The aims of this proposal were several: 1. to provoke in St. Petersburg explanations of the objectives of Russian policy; 2. to restrain Russian designs on the Turks if possible; 3. to share in the spoils of the Ottoman Empire if Catherine's plans of partition became unavoidable. Ironically, the Ancien Regime in France was forced by its weakness to reformulate its Russian diplomacy in a fashion which foreshadowed the policy that Napoleon I would pursue from a position of strength.

Mark Batunskii, Islam and Russian culture in the eighteenth century. If Russian historians are to be believed, even before the Slavs were converted to Christianism, the pagan Slavic culture was opposed to "Asia." After the Russians have been baptized, this opposition turned into "unconditional Islamophobia": Culture and the Good were represented by Orthodoxy and Russia, whereas Islam stood for Barbarism and Anticulture. Such was the Manichean vision of the Muscovites until the advent of the Empire of Peter the Great. As a matter of fact, in the eighteenth century, Russia became a multinational and multireligious Empire, but in the eyes of the intellectual Russian elite, the East - particularly the Muslim East - remained the symbol of Barbarism and a Tatar, the model of boundless cruelty, deceitfulness and cold-blooded wickedness. "The Tatars, said Pushkin, brought us neither algebra nor Aristotle." Orthodox theology added to this image the belief that Muslims knew nothing about God or moral principles. The theme representing Russia as a shield, sacrificing itself in order to protect the German-Latin civilization of Central and Western Europe appeared in the eighteenth century. But at the same time, under the influence of Western literature, the theme of Muslim East began to make its way, among Russian novelists and poets. It is also during the eighteenth century that were laid the foundations of the scientific Russian Orientalism. The first Russian translation of the Coran dates from 1716.

Antonella Salomoni, Lenin censured: two unpublished extracts dated December 1917. It would seem that a speech made by Lenin in December 1917 had been censured in various editions of his works. The text in question is a short extract and the reason given for cancelling it is the poor material condition of the original documents. Furthermore, a research among the sources allows to establish a version of the speech as a whole differing from the official version. The censuring of the speech prevented historians from establishing the relationship between the problem of "barter" and the struggle for wages in the aftermath of the revolution; it also concealed the fact that Lenin had been severely challenged at a meeting. The object of the present article is to replace the sentence in question where it truly belongs, thus restoring the speech as a whole, and to set it within the "forgotten" assembly and thus within the framework of history.

Jean-Pierre Mousson-Lestang, Three letters of Chicherin, Shliapnikov and Radek respectively concerning the relations between the Bolsheviks and Sweden, 1911-1919. Swedish archives contain three letters that project an interesting light on former relations between Russian and Swedish Social Democrats. The first of these letters is the one addressed on August 8, 1911 by Chicherin to Hjulman Branting. The other two were written by Alexander Shliapnikov and Karl Radek respectively; the first is dated May 16, 1916; the second is undated but has probably been sent during summer 1919. The three documents witness in various manners the importance that the RSDWP attached to the Swedes. Whilst Leninist Bolsheviks endeavored to conquer the adhesion to their thesis of Zimmerwaldian "Young Swedes," ambiguous relations were being maintained until 1917 with members of Swedish majority led by Branting, a dominant and too little known personality of the Ilnd International.

Craig Graham McKay, A glimpse of Borodin... M.N. Roy has given an amusing portrait of Comrade Borodin's arrival in Mexico in 1919. But what was Borodin doing prior to his mission to the New World with the Crown Jewels? On the basis of Scandinavian police reports, the author supplies a piece of the puzzle and at the same time throws some light on the propaganda activities of the Bolsheviks.

Catherine Poujol, The Bukharan Jews or the permanence of a community. The present-day study of the specific group constituted by the Jews of Bukhara would certainly help to understand the nationalities' problem in the Soviet Central Asia. The Jews of Bukhara represent the only non-Muslim community that remained in this region after its conquest by the Arabs in the eighth century and that played a rather important part - often concealed - in the problems originating from contacts between Russians and Muslims since the nineteenth century and especially since the colonization of Turkestan. Although R. Loewenthal considers that they are completely assimilated, the Jews of Bukhara seem on the contrary, in the light of recent observations, to have remained solidly attached to their faith and their tradition, which goes to demonstrate the permanent character of this community.