Apr 21 2010
History as Farce
Update: Figes has admitted that he himself was the author of the nasty reviews, contrary to his earlier statements.
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Noted UK public intellectual and historian of Russia Orlando Figes has found himself in a rather embarrassing situation that’s big news in the UK, where the private lives of historians get the kind of publicity we Americans can only dream of.
It seems as though Figes’ wife was posting nasty anonymous reviews on amazon.com of competing historians, notably Robert Service and Rachel Polonsky. After Polonsky got suspicious, she and Service did detective work up the electronic trail to find Figes’ wife.
So why was Polonsky singled out? Best guess–back in 2002, she wrote a scathing review of Figes’ Natasha’s Dance for the Times Literary Supplement. In it, she was careful not to accuse Figes of plagiarism. There’s a track record of legal action under plaintiff-friendly English libel law when that happens. (To be fair, Polonsky has also used English libel law to her benefit.) Nonetheless, Polonsky made it clear that she found unattributed borrowing in Natasha’s Dance, much as Richard Pipes had when he reviewed Figes’ A People’s Tragedy in the New Republic.
I had a rather striking moment along those lines myself in grad school. I had read Mark Von Hagen’s Soldiers in the Proletarian Dictatorship (1990), which included a memorable anecdote about Dora Elkina, who was trying to teach Red Army soldiers to read with childish sentences about Masha eating kasha:
After some frustrating moments that brought her close to tears, she hit upon the idea of turning the lesson into a political discussion and explained to the soldiers why they could not be with their Mashas and why the country was experiencing a shortage of kasha. (p. 103)
So I was struck when reading Figes’ A People’s Tragedy (1997) to find this without a reference to Von Hagen:
Close to tears, she hit upon the idea of turning the lesson into a political discussion and explained to the soldiers why they could not go home to their Mashas, and why the country was short of kasha. (p. 601)
Years later, I ran across this. Richard Pipes’ The Russian Revolution (1990) has this character sketch of Lenin:
The first impression he [Lenin] made on new acquaintances, then and later, was unfavorable. His short, stocky figure, his premature baldness . . . his slanted eyes and high cheekbones, his brusque manner of speaking, often accompanied by a sarcastic laugh, repelled most people. Contemporaries are virtually at one in speaking of his unprepossessing, “provincial” appearance. On meeting him, A. N. Potresov saw a “typical middle-aged tradesman from some northern, Iaroslavl-like province.” (p. 348)
Figes’ People’s Tragedy has this, also without a reference to Pipes:
At first, Lenin made a bad impression on the Marxists in St. Petersburg. Many of them were repelled by this short and stocky figure with his egg-shaped, balding head, small piercing eyes, dry sarcastic laugh, brusqueness and acerbity. Lenin was a newcomer and his musty and ‘provincial’ appearance was distinctly unimpressive. Potresov described him at their first meeting as a ‘typical middle-aged tradesman from some northern Yaroslavl’ province.’ (p. 147)
UPDATE: the Times of London has an anonymous discussion of the legal intricacies behind the poison pen reviews.
[...] is the original post: THE RUSSIAN FRONT » History as Farce Post a [...]
I beg to differ here.
In the first case, Figes quotes Dora Elkina (note 21, p.851). In the second, he quotes Potresov and Ulam (note 28, p.831). Potresov’s book (1937) is ALSO quoted by Pipes, as for Ulam, his seminal work The Bolsheviks was published in 1965 ! So in this case, Mr Figes has the absolute right to sue russian-front.com for libel.
I’m unclear, historian, how the presentation of quotations from Figes’ work constitutes libel of Figes.
You’re implying that he’s guilty of plagiarism, hence the libel aka defamation.
But it is true that the way Mr Figes uses quotations is somewhat unorthodox : in the same vein, Mrs Catriona Kelly (Russian children specialist) was accused of plagiarism by one Russian author, Druzhnikov, for using material of his book about Pavlik Morozov without saying that Druzhnikov was the first to use it.
I’m implying only that I find the passages in the post to be quite similar. I make no claim about how or why that similarity came to be.
I’m curious–what do you mean by Figes’ “somewhat unorthodox” use of quotations?
[...] the heels of this week’s revelations regarding Orlando Figes’ sock-puppet denunciations of “rival” historians via Amazon.com comes breaking news of yet another scandal [...]
By “unorthodox”, I mean that he sometimes omits to quote authors such as Pipes, considered by him as a “man of the past”, “a right-winger”, etc. (see A people’s tragedy), and prefers to use sources Pipes himself used. In your example, he quotes Elkina, but not Von Hagen. The problem with your posting is that when one reads it, he gets the impression Figes doesn’t quote anybody, which is untrue.
As a man of the profession and your colleague, I’d like to stress that despite those unfortunate events, Figes has all my sympathy : thanks to him, a lot of students got interested by Russian history. This could never have happened if they’ve had to read the dry prose of Lewin or Fitzpatrick.
Historian,
Thanks for the clarification. Let me clarify myself–in the passages I included above, Figes certainly did have footnotes. My only point is that those footnotes did not include Pipes and Von Hagen. In addition, I agree with you that Figes can indeed spin a good story. No one has suggested he is unable to write well.
That said, I would point out briefly that Mark Von Hagen would be difficult to describe as either a man of the past or a right-winger.
I’m hoping “Historian” here is tongue-in-cheek. Because the quotes given would absolutely get students where I teach charged with plagiarism even if they HAD cited Pipes or Von Hagen; paraphrase that close is theft. Certainly without the cite this is entirely unexcusable.
Speaking of the writing quality of Fitzpatrick and Figes, here’s Figes from “Peasant Russia, Civil War,” page 5:
The civil war, as Sheila Fitzpatrick has remarked “was not an
unforeseeab!e act of God for which the Bolsheviks were in no way
responsible.” During the winter of 1917, the Bolsheviks had
knowingly risked—and perhaps even sought—civil war by seizing
power on the eve of the Second Soviet Congress (25 October), by
closing down the SR-dominatcd Constituent Assembly (6 January), and by signing the ’shameful peace’ of Brest-Litovsk (3 March).
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And here’s the full passage from Fitzpatrick’s “Russian Revolution” that he quotes here:
The Civil War was not an unforeseeable act of God for
which the Bolsheviks were in no way responsible. On the contrary,
the Bolsheviks had associated themselves with armed confrontation
and violence in the months between February and October 1917;
and, as the Bolshevik leaders knew perfectly well before the event,
their October coup was seen by many as an outright provocation to
civil war. The Civil War certainly gave the new regime a baptism by
fire, and thereby influenced its future development. But it was the
kind of baptism the Bolsheviks had risked, and may even have
sought. (Fitzpatrick, The Russian Revolution)
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Figes “risked–and perhaps even sought” is not identical to Fitzpatrick’s “risked, and may even have sought.” But it’s certainly not ok to do this sort of thing.
Thanks for your comments, David.
An additional follow-up to Historian’s last comment. I should have said, but neglected to, that we can all agree that as scholars our obligation to cite others is independent of their age or politics. If we use the ideas, words, or data of another scholar, we have a professional obligation to show that.
David brings up an interesting example. A well-turned phrase like Fitzpatrick’s, it seems to me, is the sort of thing that could inadvertently stick in someone’s head. The question becomes whether such instances are isolated or common.
Thanks indeed for your example David, but I was sincere in my apology for Figes. If we refer to this link : http://library.csusm.edu/plagiarism/howtoavoid/how_avoid_paraphrase.htm#
then what Figes does is close to ok to me since he quotes Fitzpatrick.
If that kind of sentence is theft, then 99% of historians should be also charged, including Pipes and Fitzpatrick. In the example mentioned by DStone, Pipes uses sources as Ulam, and his sentence obviously paraphrases Ulam’s work, which is easy to find thanks to Google books (no publicty intended).
Students have to understand that paraphrase is somewhat unavoidable when one works essentially as a “lumper” and not a “splitter” (See John Gaddis: Strategies of Containment, a critical appraisal of american national security policy during the cold war, 2005, p.vii), and especially when this lumper writes for the general reader which hates footnotes and avoids bying a book when he sees to many of them (and the editor too in fact).
A historian that can be considered as a “lumper”, and which I prefer over Figes for various reasons, Richard Pipes (again), writes, in Russia under the old regime (Penguin edition, p.xxii) : “The format of this book precludes thorough documentation. By and large, I confine my references to direct quotations and statistical facts. But any specialist will readily recognize how deep is my dept to other, uncited historians.” Read that sentence several times : this is an overt admission of plagiarism and/or paraphrase ! And this book is considered a classic and used in many universities as a basic introduction to Russian history.
This is also the case with the famous “political neutrality”, so often proclaimed, and very rarely respected. This appears obvious when one has to deal with Soviet history, for the reasons we know, especially when one works on large periods and large subjects.
As I teach my students, history is by no way an exact science. History is not only made of facts, but also ideas, hypotheses, conflicts, “blood and guts”. People who try to prove the contrary by using pseudo-scientific quotations from Foucault or Bourdieu are frauds. Another thing students have to remember is that there are two kinds of histories that deserve respect : the history for the historian and the history for the general reader. Each one has its codes of writing (unwritten ones), each one has its advantages and disadvantages. And last but not least, every historian is a man of his era as much as he’s an individual with his own ideas.
To sum it up, Figes is certainly no lumper of the Pipes or Malia scale ; he’s much more intellectually limited and has some major ego problems. But the fact his books are read by a lot of young people who get into Russian history (and eventually may find themselves in a Russian history course), and that they demonstrate, once again, the criminal essence of communism, are the reason we should not be overcritical with him.
This response thread is indeed getting long, but I’d be grateful, Historian, if you could let me know what you’re looking at. Double-checking my copy of Ulam’s _The Bolsheviks_, the page cited by Figes (p. 118) has nothing about Lenin’s appearance or about other Marxists’ reaction to him.
Just go to Googlebooks, look for the 1998 edition, type “brusqueness” (Figes, p.147) and then find the corresponding page in your edition. I don’t have the original book, I just checked by keywords. And again, even if Figes gives the wrong page, that doesnt mean he’s a fraud. Everybody can make mistakes!
Indeed, the answer is getting long, but that’s the price to pay for accusing someone of plagiarism! I’d be grateful if this discussion could find its way into your classroom. Since you didn’t comment on Pipe’s sentence, I gather you accept my main argument.
Actually, I don’t agree with your point about Pipes. It seems to me there’s a useful distinction between on one hand a synthetic work which draws on the research of other scholars, and on the other hand employing the language of other scholars without credit.
And on Ulam as well, we may have to agree to disagree. We’re looking at the same material, but seeing different things. P. 116 in Ulam does indeed use the words “brusque” and “brusqueness,” but there’s nothing there about Lenin’s physical appearance.
Lenin’s appearance must come from Potresov, also quoted by Figes. Everyone seems to be obsessed by Figes at this very point. To me there is one explanation : this guy received a lot of praise for his work and became a star (obviously it counts since you mention in your biography your “prize-winning book”). I know it can be really frustrating (I got a book myself) when someone uses your work and gets all the praise just because “he knows how to write”, and you did all the spade work in the archives (I suppose that after his thesis, Figes never worked in the archives and paid people to do the work for him). But that’s an eternal debate between art for the masses and art for the critics : what pleases the masses rarely pleases the critics…
Anyway, I think that, again, one should not judge Figes too severily. His books are a very good introduction to Russian history, and if one is interested in more complexity, one always can do so.
Have just finished swimming through A People’s Tragedy (hence my comment a year after this post) and immediately recalled the part quoted about Elkina. This is the issue for me: it’s not that Figes simply takes the information from the original sources. He omits any reference to the “shoulders of giants” who led him to them. He then uses their terms, ideas and plan as his own with slight changes but which my students would not get away with when submitting their works through turnitin.com. The section on Elkina perfectly shows this to be plagiarism- as you correctly write, “employing the language of other scholars without credit.” By adding nothing but only what is found in his predecessors’ work, he cannot even plead to have been selecting the information to present to his readers but is completely indebted to what others have considered important.