Tag: Lenin

Novel as biography (Radek reviewed in ‘Against the Current’)

In his 1995 novel Radek, published in English translation for the first time last year by Monthly Review Press, Stefan Heym portrays Karl Radek as not only a man of the world but a perpetual outsider — a socially awkward contrarian with stereotypically Jewish features, thick glasses and a big mouth. In this, Heym likely saw in Karl Radek something of a kindred spirit.

NEW! Radek: A Novel, by Stefan Heym (EXCERPTS)

NEW! Radek: A Novel, by Stefan Heym (EXCERPTS)

…Stalin asked, “So you think my truth needs improvement?”
“The truth,” Radek replied, “can’t be improved. The truth is true, or it is not. But a line of evidence can gain a great deal by new and better evidence…”