Zizek on Lenin

November 7, 2011

“In February 1917 Lenin was an almost anonymous political emigrant,
stranded in Zurich, with no reliable contacts to Russia, mostly learning
about the events from the Swiss press; in October 1917 he led the first
successful socialist revolution - so what happened in between? In February,
Lenin immediately perceived the revolutionary chance, the result of unique
contingent circumstances - if the moment was not seized, the chance for the
revolution would be forfeited, perhaps for decades. In his stubborn insistence
that one should take the risk and go on to the next stage - that is,
repeat the revolution - he was alone, ridiculed by the majority of the
Central Committee members of his own party; this selection of his texts
endeavours to provide a glimpse into the obstinate, patient - and often
frustrating - revolutionary work through which Lenin imposed his vision.
Indispensable as Lenin’s personal intervention was, however, we should not
change the story of the October Revolution into the story of the lone genius
confronted with the dis orientated masses and gradually imposing his vision.
Lenin succeeded because his appeal, while bypassing the Party nomenklatura, found an echo in what I am tempted to call revolutionary micropolitics:
the incredible explosion of grass-roots democracy, of local committees
sprouting up all around Russia’s big cities and, ignoring the authority of
the “legitimate” government, taking matters into their own hands. This is
the untold story of the October Revolution, the obverse of the myth of the
tiny group of ruthless dedicated revolutionaries which accomplished a coup
d’etat.”
-Zizek