How would you describe Lenin’s style of writing and argument?

1.How would you describe Lenin’s style of writing and argument? What’s the connection

between style and substance?

2. What is the role of Lenin’s “vanguard fighter” “guided by the most advanced theory” and

cloaked in secrecy?

3. How does Lenin’s pragmatism compare with “pure” or philosophical Marxism? Does the

state “wither away” as Marx prophecized?

4. Describe the humanism of Gramsci (“the dominant factor in history [is] not raw

economic facts, but man . . .”). How, according to Gramsci, does this contrast with Karl

Marx and economic determinism?

5. Skim the Stalin reading (pp. 211-215). Stalin quotes Lenin: “The fundamental question of

revolution is the question of power.” Discuss & contrast with other theorists we’ve

studied.

Answers need to be at least 5 sentences and they need to be from the book.