Talk:Julius Martov

Dustbin of History story

Martov became politically marginalised, best exempified by Trotsky's comment to him as he left a meeting of the council of Soviets in disgust at the way in which the Bolsheviks had seized political power, "go to where you belong, the dustbin of history". Martov silently walked away without looking back. He paused at the exit seeing a young Bolshevik worker wearing a black shirt with a broad leather belt, standing in the shadow of the portico. The young man turned on Martov with unconcealed bitterness: 'And we amongst ourselves had thought, Martov would at least will remain with us.' Martov stopped and with a characteristic movement tossed up his head to emphasisie his reply: 'One day you will understand the crime in which you are taking part,'. Waving his hand wearily he left the hall.

This is a very nice story I'm sure, and is written very poetically, but is there any factual evidence to back it it up? --Horses In The Sky 10:49, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

It reads like a paraphrase of one part of Nikolai Sukhanov's classic account of the Second Soviet Congress in his 7 volume history of the Russian revolution. I can look it up tonight. What's worse, the whole article is riddled with omissions and outright factual errors and needs to be rewritten. One of these days, I'll get to it.

Of course, the whole Menshevik article needs to be rewritten as well, not to mention the fact that we don't have anything on Sukhanov, Boris Bogdanov, or other Menshevik leaders of the February Revolution. And then there are all the other players that will need to be added at some point... Ahasuerus 18:12, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Istanbul

The city's name was Istanbul at the time, it was not Constantinople.

85.102.191.67

You appear to have your facts wrong, from the page Constantinople#Names it says and I quote, "Constantinople was officially renamed İstanbul by the Republic of Turkey on March 28, 1930." and if you don't believe that look here [1], where it says "1930: Constantinople changes its name officially into Istanbul.", granted it also says "Istanbul had been the popular name of the city for 5 centuries already." but officially it remained Constantinople until 1930 and seeing as Martov was born in 1873 this should be the name used. Horses In The Sky ^{talk contributions}

Trotsky's Affiliation

Leon Trotsky too was a member of the Menshevik faction for a brief period but soon broke with them.

I've left this in the article, but it's not substantially correct. Trostky was, at least nominally, a Menshevik from the split in 1903 til April 1917, though he didn't always follow the group in reality. I don't know whether it is best to remove this statement altogether, as it is not pertinent to the article, or reword it to make it clearer. Ephemera (talk) 19:26, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

In think it would be more correct to say that Trotsky stood between the factions after breaking with the Mensheviks in 1904 IIRC. For most of this period he belonged to those who sought to heal the rift between the factions, a grouping often referred to as the Conciliators. It's true that more than occasionally in polemic Lenin lumped the Conciliators together with the Mensheviks in one amalgam but there was no real organisational link between Trotsky and the Mensheviks after 1904 other than the fact that both Trotsky and the Mensheviks considered themselves to be members of the same party, the RSDLP. --Mia-etol (talk) 15:40, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Sophistry. This "was a member of the Menshevik faction for a brief period but soon broke with them" is simply put there by someone who cannot deny that Trotsky was a Meshevik (it is a matter of historical record) but wants to severely underplay it, they are embarassed by it and want to make it look like something that didn't really happen. Trotsky wrote for and organised with the Mesheviks as part of their organisation up until 1917. Talk about POV getting into an article :-D 82.71.39.170 (talk) 16:31, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

I have changed this part in the article to: "Leon Trotsky too was a member of the Menshevik faction until 1917." EmSim15 (talk) 18:02, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

"Hamlet of the Russian Revolution"

I am curious what others think about removing this comment from the first paragraph. To me, this comment is a result of a rivalry and has no real bearing on who Martov was as an organizer and revolutionary. It may be useful to mention it at some point within the article, but I feel like it is unlikely that it is useful in the intro, and paints the wrong picture of Martov. (Check out the "Introduction" in Paul Kellog's 2022 translation of Martov's work World Bolshevism (pp. 20-25) to see what I am talking about and the issues with this characterization). EmSim15 (talk) 18:00, 27 April 2023 (UTC)

One source

By my count 21 of the 51 references in this article, nearly half, are to one source, Figues. This seems rather excessive, particularly for someone who is not an obscure figure. PatGallacher (talk) 16:21, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

This article doesn't merit a one-source tag at all. There are over 10 other sources referenced and Figes is considered to be one of the foremost experts on the Russian revolutions. Citations could be in one constant style. Meanderingbartender (talk) 16:58, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

He may be, but he's hardly the only one on what is not exactly an obscure historical episode. PatGallacher (talk) 17:55, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

And that's why there's over ten other references listed. Meanderingbartender (talk) 17:58, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree that it may be a bit excessive and we could work to add to it. I also don't think there needs to be a bibliography with only that source either. We should either remove that section or add all the other sources to it. EmSim15 (talk) 03:29, 9 May 2023 (UTC)