The Claremont Review of Books is of course the flagship publication of the Claremont Institute. I find in every issue an education in the true understanding of politics and statesmanship. It is my favorite magazine. Purchase an annual subscription here for $19.95 and get immediate online access to the whole thing.
The Fall 2018 issue of the CRB has just gone to the printer. The editors have given me a free run through the galley proof to let me select essays and reviews with which to preview the issue for Power Line readers. The issue is rich with reviews of notable biographies. I have selected four of these reviews to bring to your attention along with Bill Voegeli’s essay on books on race. We will have a big, beautiful share of the intellectual heart and soul of this issue.
Walter Newll reviews Viktor Sebestyn’s compelling new biography of Lenin in “Lust for destruction.” Sebestyn’s biography has just been published in paperback. Stephen Kotkin is writing a monumental biography of Stalin. Two volumes have been published so far and the first is available in paperback as well. Ian Ona Johnson reviews the first two volumes of Kotkin’s work in “Blood-soaked monster.”
I commend these reviews to your attention. Both of the biographies raise the Leninist question: What is to be done? In the face of the totalitarian temptation, it has become the permanent question.
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