Three Revolutions: Russia, China, Cuba and the Epic Journeys That Changed the World

Historian Hall (Ten Days in Harlem) reconsiders in this sweeping account how three “epoch-defining” uprisings—the communist revolutions in Russia, China, and Cuba—were shaped in the popular imagination by the American journalists who reported on the “epic journeys” of their revolutionary leaders. He begins with John Reed, a leftist journalist who wrote Ten Days That Shook the World (1919), a passionate account of Vladimir Lenin and the October Revolution that would come to be viewed as a “handbook” for future revolutionaries. Hall then pivots to Edgar Snow, author of the bestseller Red Star over China (1937), an as-told-to autobiography of Mao Zedong; and to Herbert Matthews’s genial 1957 New York Times interview with Fidel Castro. In lucid and enlightening passages, Hall traces these works’ complex ramifications among both radicals who revered them and anticommunists who smeared them. Less gratifying are Hall’s long recreations of the “epic journeys” themselves—Lenin’s secret passage through a hostile Germany and the Red Army’s Long March through China make for at times high-octane reading, but their lengthy inclusion feels off-point. Hall’s tight focus on the mythologizing power of these journalistic reports means that the politics of the revolutions and motivations of the revolutionaries themselves go somewhat underaddressed. Still, this contains keen insights and some riveting histories that will appeal to readers interested in the radical movements of the 20th century. (Sept.)