Crucibles of Power

Through diaries, memoirs and other documents illuminating the lives of individual Soviet citizens, Mr. David-Fox evokes the turbulent experience of what he calls ‘the crucial elements of choice, decision making, and agency.’ -- Gary Saul Morson * Wall Street Journal *
[An] important book…compelling. -- Francine Hirsh * Times Literary Supplement *
A detailed examination of the tragic history of the western Soviet territories that swapped hands between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany twice between 1941 and 1943. -- Maria Lipman * Foreign Affairs *
David-Fox offers a sophisticated new way to study authoritarian states…what makes the study truly pathbreaking is its focus on autobiographical sources, incorporating the stories of a wide range of witnesses and participants. This allows him to examine how ‘microdoses of power’ shaped the lives of the residents of this region…By focusing on the exercise of power and the fraught choices facing those caught within its grip, David-Fox teaches us important lessons about life in authoritarian societies. -- Alan Barenberg * Los Angeles Review of Books *
An unusually deep and textured view of the development of the Smolensk region during the 1930s and World War II…will be extremely valuable to any student or scholar interested in the brutal war and occupation on the eastern front. -- Norman M. Naimark * Russian Review *
A guide to what social history—and the study of eastern Europe writ large—can offer in an age of resurgent authoritarianism and politicized memory. The power of Crucibles of Power lies in its refusal to close the moral ledger, to impose simple binaries, or to deliver narrative closure. This is a book that demands a reckoning, not just with the past, but with how we continue to write it. -- Jan Burzlaff * Slavic Review *
A bold, innovative book that is written in a clear, lively, often dramatic style…This book is rich in now-inaccessible archive sources that are blended into a strong narrative which is destined to be read, consulted, and cited for decades to come. -- Alfred J. Rieber * H-Diplo *
A monumental study of the Stalinist political revolution for the twenty-first century…brings the field of modern Russian history in conceptual and methodological conversation with the discipline of history as a whole. -- Anna Krylova * Slavic Review *
Meticulously researched with new material from Russian archives, this book engagingly and expertly explores the many facets of the Smolensk Archive. -- Jacqueline Parascandola * Library Journal (starred review) *
A new history of the war-torn Smolensk region during the period 1929–45…David-Fox is to be commended for sorting out the archival evidence to create a balanced historiography of the period. -- A. M. Mayer * Choice *
An unsettling look at dictatorial rule…Invaluable insights into two genuine dystopias. * Kirkus Reviews *
In this examination of the Smolensk Archives, which laid the foundation for American understandings of Soviet power, Michael David-Fox offers a much more complicated and comprehensive presentation of Soviet power relations than previously available. Crucibles of Power is a masterpiece of historical analysis and narration, and a sterling example of how new methodologies and new archives can come together to change our understanding of the past. -- Serhii Plokhy, author of The Gates of Europe
With the erudition of a historian and the acuity of a master storyteller, David-Fox puts us in the company of people who lived then and there. An essential book for anyone curious about life under totalitarian power. -- John Connelly, author of From People into Nations
Smolensk is a kind of sacred land for American historiography. Drawing on a huge amount of new material from Russian archives, this book examines Smolensk primarily during World War II, when the inhabitants of this westernmost region of Russia had to endure two changes of power and compare the effects of Nazism and Stalinism on their own skin. Crucibles of Power will appeal not only to professional historians but also to a much wider range of readers. -- Oleg Budnitskii, author of Russian Jews Between the Reds and the Whites, 1917–1920
An examination of power dynamics in radically illiberal regimes, Crucibles of Power is a masterful study of a past full of unsettling resonances with the present. Deeply theorized yet fluently written, this book guides us through the histories of Stalinism, Nazism, the Holocaust, and World War II in Russia’s Smolensk Region. -- Mark Edele, author of Russia’s War against Ukraine
A true tour de force. This book deserves to be read by anyone interested in the war in the East, Soviet rule, or the twentieth century more broadly. -- Peter Holquist, author of Making War, Forging Revolution
A work of tremendous power…engaging…David-Fox’s extraordinary confrontation of the human, the all-too human, in his analysis of collaboration, opportunism, and zealotry acknowledges the sustained desire for narrative and myth. It does so even as it scrupulously retrieves the experiences which make such a desire untenable. -- Peter Fritzsche * H-Diplo *
Combining wide-ranging reflection with a more traditional monographic approach is itself an ambitious challenge, one that is suited to gifted historians who have the reach and maturity to tackle. David-Fox rises to the challenge with virtuosity…Essential. -- Vanessa Voisin * H-Diplo *