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Exit Stalin

The Soviet Union as a Civilization, 1953-1991

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Exit Stalin

By: Mark B. Smith
Narrated by: Jonathan Keeble
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Summary

Brought to you by Penguin.

An extraordinarily atmospheric and powerful history of the world's largest country and its decline and fall.

With Stalin's death, the Soviet Union remained a repressive, harsh and belligerent place, but one which became more predictable for its citizens and one which made a genuine attempt to create the egalitarian, progressive country that the Russian Revolution had once promised. That this attempt would fail was not clear until the 1980s.

Mark B. Smith's remarkable book recreates the day-to-day life of this vast state, the largest ever to exist. What was life like in a country which made such absolute claims for the future, which claimed to be on its way to creating a people's utopia and which, like the USA, owned enough atomic weapons to end human life on Earth?

Exit Stalin is filled with extraordinary stories about those who lived in the USSR and the distinctive and functioning civilization that they built. Many of them embraced its values, understood its goals and could not imagine life outside such a vastly ambitious and progressive project. The shortages, coercion and incompetence that underlay the USSR - and which by the late 1980s would doom it - has to be understood alongside the acceptance it always had from many of its citizens. And this in turn is a crucial issue for understanding Russia and the rest of the former Soviet Union in the 21st century.

© Mark B. Smith 2026 (P) Penguin Audio 2026

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Critic reviews

Accessible and comprehensive … Smith's authentic account of Soviet life is enlivened by biographical sketches and his deep understanding of Russian culture and society
Deeply informed … A significant book for anybody who seeks to understand modern Russia
Smoothly readable … A fascinating chronicle of the Soviet Union … Exit Stalin offers a superb history of the rise and fall of a utopian state and its dangerously deluded ideology
Superb... Immensely important... This is a tragic story, and Smith tells it magnificently
Richly detailed... Mark Smith’s impressive history gives readers a powerful sense of what it was like to live under communism in the four decades between Stalin’s death and the country’s disintegration at the end of the cold war
Exit Stalin asks a timely question: what is life in a non-democratic modern society actually like? Smith builds up a picture of an entire culture, a way of life, a vivid sense of an entire disappeared world and forces the question: would you accept the price? (Owen Hatherley)
Vivid ... Excellent ... An essential and accessible addition to the library of Soviet and post-Soviet studies
Despite the vast complexities and scope of Exit Stalin, Smith manages to fully immerse the reader throughout ... What is clear, even within the first few pages, is that this is a landmark work on Russian history, one like no other, and a gold mine filled with emotional power and unknown stories (Caroline Eden)
Meticulously researched ... For anyone interested in a dispassionate overview of the late Soviet period, it makes for fascinating reading'
A sweeping social history of Soviet life in the decades between Stalin’s death and the union’s collapse … Smith’s great achievement is to have written this civilization from the inside out — in the food queues and the bookshops, in the guitar songs and the blat networks, in the millions of new apartments with their own kitchen tables (Jan Burzlaff)
All stars
Most relevant
A detailed yet gripping analysis of the post Stalin Soviet history with great emphasis on the human history and individuals involved. The author has written both a scholarly work and one that is very accessible to anyone with an interest in this period and in particular the slow and the very rapid decline of the Soviet Union. Highly recommended and very well read

An extraordinarily good history

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The honesty and clarity of sources, times and location by the author. It helped my understanding of a period and country which I've always been interested in - outstanding account.

excellent account of the period

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Wonderfully detailed history of this fascinating subject.
An all encompassing study of the issues, players and fall out of decisions made over this period which continue to have reverberations today.
Excellent.

Incisive History

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I enjoyed this book and gained some useful new insights into life after Stalin. The book is engaging for the general reader, despite a few lapses into the arcane language of the acadamic. The audiobook is also beautifully narrated.
However, the author overstates the importance of nationalism in the demise of the USSR. While it may have nailed down the coffin lid, the crucial elements of fear and coercion in making the planned economy function was very understated. The ‘liberal’ reforms made after 1953, under the new regime of ‘mature socialism’, eased the fear and coercion that drove the Soviets’ technocratic, planned economy forward. That is much more likely the source of the USSR’s decline with its failing productivity, inability to match the West militarily and technologically. The Afghanistan and Chernobyl disasters brought all this into sharp relief for both its elites and general population. The USSR’s break up in 1991 -
its ‘accidental suicide’ - was more likely the final collapse of confidence of a sclerotic system in the face of the rising ethnic nationalism of its republics and increasing failure to compete with the capitalist West.

Insightful but flawed

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This immensely scholarly and well-researched book is written in a very accessible and engaging style which uses frequent vignettes and human examples to paint a vivid picture of the true nature of the Soviet Union post-Stalin. Rather than merely being a straight, documentary history Smith manages to get inside the soul of the USSR and really help the reader understand how the system really felt and worked. No doubt being married to a Muscovite gave the author something of a head start, but he has also made frequent visits to post-Soviet Russia to explore the archives in depth and to interview key players. I highly recommend this book to anyone wishing to understand the USSR.

Fascinating!

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