Lenin: A Study on the Unity of his Thought. Georg Lukacs 1924
The following short account does not for a moment claim to deal in any way exhaustively with the theory and practice of Lenin. It is merely an attempt – in rough outline – to show the relationship between the two, written in the belief that it is precisely this relationship which is not clearly enough in evidence, even in the minds of many Communists. Not only would thorough treatment of all these problems require considerably more space than these few pages; there is also not nearly enough material available for such an account of Lenin’s life-work, particularly for those to whom the relevant Russian literature is only accessible in translation. The story of Lenin’s life must be set in the historical framework of at least the last thirty to forty years. Let us hope a study worthy of the task is soon available. The author of these introductory remarks is himself deeply aware of how difficult it is to write about individual problems before the totality of which they form part has been clarified – to popularize before what is to be popularized has been established with incontestable scholarship. For this reason no attempt has been made to present the problems which occupied Lenin’s life either in their entirety or in the exact order in which they occurred. Their selection, sequence, and development are dictated exclusively by the desire to make their interrelationship stand out as clearly as is conceivably possible. The quotations, too, are selected on this basis and not on one of chronological accuracy.
Vienna, February 1924