Lenin never mentioned the book after 1910 -- he (quite correctly) saw it only relevant to the period prior to legalization of the RSDLP.
By "revolutionary theory" he quite clearly meant _Kautsky's_ Marxism. He continued to view Kautsky as _the_ interpreter of Marx _even_ after Kautsky had turned reengage: when he called Kautsky a reengage he meant renegade to his (Kautsky's) own Marxist theory. Many books of Kautsky were published in the SU after the revolution, and Lenin had them all in his library, some with approving annotations in the margin.
"Professional Revolutionary" is a totally false translation into English. Probably the best translation would be "skill in not getting arrested." Unlike the anarchist pareti3es which preceded the RSDLP, that party was _not_ a conspiratorial Party but one which had agitation and propaganda as its primary function. Those activities (prior to 1910) were illegal. Hence party cadre had to be skilled in carrying out illegal work more or less in public.
Before arguing with any of this, read Lars Lih, if not his book at least the symposium in Historical Materialism. You can also see the review by Charles Post a couple of years ago in Against the Current.
WITBD & the annotations of Hegel simply don't belong together in the same paragraph. Those annotations are fascinating, but you can't use them like a Calvinist minister quoting scripture.
WITBD focuses on imitating the SPD as closely as possible under an autocracy. It was the Bolsheviks that fought for democracy in the party in the period of WITBD.
I suggest again that the best 'image' of Lenin is Marxism-Kautskyism-Lenin Thought. An ongoing struggle to embody Kautsky's theory in Russian conditions. It was not intended to have any meaning outside of its immediate context. It was not a theoretical work. It does not pretend to the abstractness and (tendency towards) universality of Theory (as opposed to Thought in the Chinese sense of that term). Marx's critique, a truly theoretical work, was intended to identify the tendency of all possible t 'economies' (or the "Ideal Average" of capitalism as he put it in Vol. III. Lenin had no such intentions.
Carrol
> -----Original Message-----
> From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org [mailto:lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org]
On
> Behalf Of Mike Ballard
> Sent: Saturday, September 29, 2012 6:15 PM
> To: lbo lbo
> Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] [Pen-l] Meditations on Trotsky and Occupy_2
>
> Points of information: This was the same Lenin who wrote: "Without
revolutionary
> theory there can be no revolutionary movement." and..."It is impossible
> completely to understand Marx's Capital, and especially its first Chapter,
without
> having thoroughly studied and understood the whole of Hegel's Logic.
> Consequently, half a century later none of the Marxists understood Marx!!"
And
> the same theorist Trotsky who led the Red Army against the Kronstadt
rebellion.
> Trotsky wired Zinoviev re the Kronstadt sailors, in revolt for the
fulfillment of the
> promises of the Revolution, "Shoot them like partridges."
>
> Over and out,
> Mike B)
> *****************************************************************
>
> And yet this theorist led the Red Army to victory.
>
> ???
>
> Joanna
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> Lenin was not a theorist -- he rather 'applied' Kautsky to Russian
> conditions. (See Lars Lih). Trotsky was not only a theorist but suffered
> from the worst disease of theory: the assumption that theory could
directly
> control practice. See Lenin's article (Vol. 8) on Trotsky's words on
Father
> Gapon. Trotsky argued that there would be no more Father Gapons, and that
> Marxists would have to do that work themselves.
> *******************************************************************
> ****
> Wobbly Times
> http://wobblytimes.blogspot.com/
>
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