USSR by Walter Duranty

USSR by Walter Duranty is boring. This is particularly intriguing considering how readable his other books are. He was wrong about the soviet union and lied and lied and lied. But, nevertheless, his books were interesting to read, his articles were engaging. This one though it’s dry and boring.

As before, he wanted to tell the “truth” (lies!) about russia (ussr really). For a book published in 1944 it talks more about Napoleon and the Tsars than WWII. Of course, stalin was the best, insightful, amazing, the one who took russia from a backward country to a marvellous future of incredible progress. Yes, the stalin who was told about the attack but didn’t hear it, was the insightful one who could see years into the future. Also, ussr was getting rations, fuel, shoes under lend-lease. I was expecting that. Duranty was a simp for stalin, but the quality of the writing for this book was incredibly bad.

So, unless you are doing research and you have to read this book, I don’t see why anyone else would read it. His 1935 book was nice to read, I Write as I Please, so I’m surprised that in 9 years his style became so boring and stories so dry. I have another of his books to read, from 1949, so I hope it will be more like the 1935 one and not this one.

USSR by Walter Duranty

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My rating: 2/5 Stars
Would I recommend it: not really
Published by: J.B. Lippincott
Year it was published: 1944
Format: Hardcover
Genre(s): History
Pages: 293

About the author: Walter Duranty was a British-American journalist, born in Liverpool in 1884. He died in 1957 in US. He worked as moscow bureau chief of The New York Times for fourteen years from 1921. In 1932, Duranty received a Pulitzer Prize for a series of reports about the Soviet Union, eleven of which were published in June 1931 and 2 at the end of the year. He published a few books, both fiction and non-fiction.
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