{"id":47784,"date":"2025-08-18T13:44:35","date_gmt":"2025-08-18T13:44:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?p=47784"},"modified":"2025-08-18T13:44:35","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T13:44:35","slug":"benjamin-nathans-to-the-success-of-our-hopeless-cause-the-many-lives-of-the-soviet-dissident-movement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?p=47784","title":{"rendered":"Benjamin Nathans, \u201eTo the Success of Our Hopeless Cause:\u00a0The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement\u201c"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Beginning in the 1960s, the Soviet Union was unexpectedly confronted by a dissident movement that captured the world\u2019s imagination. Demanding that the Kremlin obey its own laws, an improbable band of Soviet citizens held unauthorized public gatherings, petitioned in support of arrested intellectuals, and circulated banned samizdat texts. Soviet authorities arrested dissidents, subjected them to bogus trials and vicious press campaigns, sentenced them to psychiatric hospitals and labor camps, sent them into exile\u2014and transformed them into martyred heroes. Against all odds, the dissident movement undermined the Soviet system and hastened its collapse. Taking its title from a toast made at dissident gatherings,&nbsp;<em>To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause<\/em>&nbsp;is a definitive history of a remarkable group of people who helped change the twentieth century.<br><br>Benjamin Nathans\u2019s vivid narrative tells the dramatic story of the men and women who became dissidents\u2014from Nobel laureates Andrei Sakharov and Alexander Solzhenitsyn to many others who are virtually unknown today. Drawing on diaries, memoirs, personal letters, interviews, and KGB interrogation records,&nbsp;<em>To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause<\/em>&nbsp;reveals how dissidents decided to use Soviet law to contain the power of the Soviet state. This strategy, as one of them put it, was \u201csimple to the point of genius: in an unfree country, they began to conduct themselves like free people.\u201d<br><br>An extraordinary account of the Soviet dissident movement,&nbsp;<em>To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause&nbsp;<\/em>shows how dissidents spearheaded the struggle to break free of the USSR\u2019s totalitarian past, a struggle that continues in Putin\u2019s Russia\u2014and that illuminates other struggles between hopelessness and perseverance today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Reviews<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cA prodigiously researched and revealing history of Soviet dissent, how it was repeatedly put down and came to life again, populated by a sprawling cast of courageous people dedicated to fighting for threatened freedoms and hard-earned rights.\u201d \u2013 <strong>Pulitzer Prize Board<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;A book about a past time that is very much a book for our time. . . . The story of the Soviet dissidents is a story from which we all stand to learn as we face a new wave of authoritarianism.&#8221; \u2013 <strong>Jeffrey C. Isaac<\/strong>,&nbsp;<em>Los Angeles Review of Books<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Awards and Recognition<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Winner of the Pushkin House Russian Book Prize<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Shortlisted for the Lionel Gelber Prize, Lionel Gelber Foundation<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Finalist for the Literary Award, Athenaeum of Philadelphia<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A Stevereads History Book of the Year<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Longlisted for the Cundill History Prize, McGill University<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>About the author<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Benjamin Nathans&nbsp;<\/strong>won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize in General Nonfiction for&nbsp;<em>To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement<\/em>&nbsp;(Princeton). He is also the author of&nbsp;<em>Beyond the Pale: The Jewish Encounter with Late Imperial Russia<\/em>, which was won the Koret Jewish Book Award, the Vucinich Book Prize, and the Lincoln Book Prize, and was a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award in History. A frequent contributor to&nbsp;<em>The New York Review of Books<\/em>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<em>The Times Literary Supplement<\/em>, Nathans is the Alan Charles Kors Endowed Term Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Publisher: <\/strong>Princeton University Press<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Published<\/strong>: Aug 13, 2024<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Copyright<\/strong>: 2024<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Pages<\/strong>: 816<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/press.princeton.edu\/books\/hardcover\/9780691117034\/to-the-success-of-our-hopeless-cause-pulitzer-prize-winner\">https:\/\/press.princeton.edu\/books\/hardcover\/9780691117034\/to-the-success-of-our-hopeless-cause-pulitzer-prize-winner<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Benjamin Nathans essay \u201eForbidden texts\u201c<\/strong>: <a href=\"https:\/\/press.princeton.edu\/ideas\/forbidden-texts\">https:\/\/press.princeton.edu\/ideas\/forbidden-texts<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47785,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[8,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-47784","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-knjige","category-novosti"],"acf":{"facebook_opis":""},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Soviet-dissidents-scaled.jpg?fit=1687%2C2560&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":55062,"url":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?p=55062","url_meta":{"origin":47784,"position":0},"title":"CfP: The Making of Solidarity: A\u00a0Conference on Eastern and Central European Dissidents, 1945-1991","author":"Branimir Jankovi\u0107","date":"24. kolovoza 2026.","format":false,"excerpt":"This open call invites proposals for an interdisciplinary conference on Eastern and Central European dissidence, solidarity, and anti-imperial thought. The Making of Solidarity: A\u00a0Conference on Eastern and Central European Dissidents, 1945-1991 16.-17. November 2026 A close reading of Ivan Dziuba\u2019s classic\u00a01965 essay Internationalism or Russification? offers a\u00a0useful lens through which\u2026","rel":"","context":"U &quot;Novosti&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Novosti","link":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/The-Making-of-Solidarity.png?fit=883%2C662&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/The-Making-of-Solidarity.png?fit=883%2C662&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/The-Making-of-Solidarity.png?fit=883%2C662&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/The-Making-of-Solidarity.png?fit=883%2C662&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":54537,"url":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?p=54537","url_meta":{"origin":47784,"position":1},"title":"Call for Applications: Visegrad Scholarship at OSA 2026\/2027","author":"Branimir Jankovi\u0107","date":"9. srpnja 2026.","format":false,"excerpt":"The\u00a0Visegrad Scholarship at Blinken OSA Archivum\u00a0(Budapest, Hungary)\u00a0supports 8-week research stays (shorter stays pro-rated) for scholars and socially engaged artists working with the Archivum\u2019s Cold War and post-Cold War collections. Each grant is\u00a03.000,00\u20ac, intended to cover travel, accommodation and living costs. Next application deadline: July 25, 2026\u00a0(for the 2026\/2027 academic year).\u2026","rel":"","context":"U &quot;Novosti&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Novosti","link":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Blinken-OSA-Archivum-Visegrad-Scholarship-at-OSA.png?fit=1200%2C624&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Blinken-OSA-Archivum-Visegrad-Scholarship-at-OSA.png?fit=1200%2C624&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Blinken-OSA-Archivum-Visegrad-Scholarship-at-OSA.png?fit=1200%2C624&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Blinken-OSA-Archivum-Visegrad-Scholarship-at-OSA.png?fit=1200%2C624&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Blinken-OSA-Archivum-Visegrad-Scholarship-at-OSA.png?fit=1200%2C624&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":55072,"url":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?p=55072","url_meta":{"origin":47784,"position":2},"title":"Victoria Khiterer, \u201eBitter War of Memory: The Babyn Yar Massacre, Aftermath, and Commemoration\u201c","author":"Branimir Jankovi\u0107","date":"25. kolovoza 2026.","format":false,"excerpt":"Bitter War of Memory: The Babyn Yar Massacre, Aftermath, and Commemoration\u00a0discusses the Holocaust in Kyiv and the efforts to memorialize the Babyn Yar massacre. 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Charter 77 at 50: Transnational Human Rights, Social Imagination, and Civic Resistance in the\u2026","rel":"","context":"U &quot;Novosti&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Novosti","link":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/hsozkult.png?fit=1006%2C241&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/hsozkult.png?fit=1006%2C241&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/hsozkult.png?fit=1006%2C241&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/hsozkult.png?fit=1006%2C241&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":55942,"url":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?p=55942","url_meta":{"origin":47784,"position":4},"title":"\u201eOur Comrades in Havana. Cuba, the Soviet Union, and Eastern Europe, 1959\u20131991\u201c \u2013\u00a0Radoslav Yordanov","author":"Filip \u0160imunjak","date":"22. listopada 2026.","format":false,"excerpt":"Using the Soviet-Cuban economic, political, military, and intelligence ties as a basis for analysis, this book aims to break new ground by more prominently factoring in Havana\u2019s relations with Moscow\u2019s Eastern European allies. The book uses an extensive range of material obtained from the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Ministerio\u2026","rel":"","context":"U &quot;Knjige&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Knjige","link":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?cat=8"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Our-Comrades-in-Havana.webp?fit=640%2C960&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Our-Comrades-in-Havana.webp?fit=640%2C960&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/historiografija.hr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Our-Comrades-in-Havana.webp?fit=640%2C960&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":55443,"url":"https:\/\/historiografija.hr\/?p=55443","url_meta":{"origin":47784,"position":5},"title":"Ivan Simic, &#8220;Sickle and Veil: Communist Gender and Policies towards Muslim Minorities in Eastern Europe&#8221;","author":"Branimir Jankovi\u0107","date":"24. rujna 2026.","format":false,"excerpt":"Communist gender policies were often violent, placing many people, particularly women, in difficult and marginalized positions. Targeted individuals were rarely consulted, yet their clothing and bodily practices were consistently policed and politicized. Across Central Asia, veils, the fez, shalvari, circumcision, and even Muslim names were banned or stigmatized. 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