Serge’s biography reveals more about Serge’s personal
political downfall than about Leon Trotsky’s life and lasting historical
impact. While this is true, the wider implications are even more significant.
His later writings act as a political weapon born from defeat, demoralisation,
and capitulation to bourgeois ideas. Today, they serve the same purpose as in
the 1940s: to hide the class struggle behind Stalinism and to obscure the
clear, principled divide between Bolshevism and its Thermidorian opponents.
The Political Degeneration of Victor Serge: From
Bolshevik to Fellow‑Traveller of the Bourgeoisie
Victor Serge’s early revolutionary history is undisputed. He
joined the Bolsheviks in 1919, when Petrograd was starving and under siege, and
he held significant roles within the Communist International. He faced
imprisonment and exile during Stalin's rule. His novels, particularly The Case
of Comrade Tulayev, vividly portray bureaucratic terror. However, Serge’s
tragedy is not a literary issue but a political one.
The setbacks of the 1930s profoundly affected him. The rise
of Hitler, the betrayal of the Spanish Revolution, the Moscow Trials, the
Stalin-Hitler Pact, and Trotsky's assassination didn't inspire in Serge the
steadfastness of a Trotskyist; instead, they led to a loss of political
direction. However, Serge was among those who “held on for a long time, but he
did not hold on to the end.”
The key indicator of this collapse is Serge's infamous
letter to André Malraux, written just six days before his death, in which he
pledged support to Charles de Gaulle. This document highlights the gravity of
his betrayal: “A man who had once manned a submachine gun post in defence of
the Bolshevik Revolution ended his life supporting a bourgeois French general.”
This isn’t merely a biographical detail; it reflects the political perspective
from which Life and Death of Leon Trotsky was authored.
II. Trotsky’s Break with Serge: A Necessary Political
Separation
Political reasons, not personal ones, drove the split
between Trotsky and Serge. Trotsky severed ties because Serge shifted towards
centrism—succumbing to vacillation, moralism, and political impressionism that
typically surface during reactionary periods. Serge’s attempts at conciliation
with the “left” critics of Bolshevism, his flirtation with anarchism, and his
increasing doubts about the dictatorship of the proletariat directly conflicted
with the core principles of the Fourth International.
Trotsky recognised that opposing Stalinism demanded a clear
understanding of Bolshevism’s historical role. Meanwhile, Serge increasingly
argued that the origins of Stalinist terror stemmed directly from the October
Revolution. This idea is a core theme of the entire “god that failed” genre,
and Serge emerged as one of its earliest and most refined proponents.
The Theoretical Bankruptcy of Life and Death of Leon
Trotsky
Serge’s biography reflects the doubts and moral
introspection that characterised his later years. It quotes Serge asking,
"Could we have misunderstood something crucial?" "Did we achieve
the opposite of our intentions?" "Have we neglected man and his
soul?" These questions are not typical of a Marxist. They reveal a man who
has forsaken historical materialism and turned towards petty-bourgeois moral
philosophy.
The biography serves a political purpose: it subtly links
Bolshevism with Stalinism, revolutionary violence with bureaucratic terror, and
Lenin with his executioners. As noted, “Serge’s late writings blur this
distinction.” This conflation is deliberate, forming the ideological basis of
Cold War anti-communism. It explains why the American right favoured Serge, the
New York Review of Books, and the post-Trotskyist intellectual circle.
IV. Why Serge Is Useful to the Pseudo‑Left Today
The renewed interest in Serge today is driven more by
political reasons than literary value. Groups such as the International
Socialist Tendency, anarchist publishers, liberal academics, and the
pseudo-left support Serge because he provides a left-leaning justification for
opposing Bolshevism. This allows them to appear aligned with the revolutionary
tradition while avoiding its core principles: the dictatorship of the
proletariat, the necessity of a vanguard party, the legitimacy of revolutionary
violence, and the fundamental doctrines of Trotskyism. "Serge is utilised
to challenge the more severe aspects of Bolshevik policy… and to imply that the
divide between Leninism and Stalinism was less pronounced than Trotsky
claimed." This encapsulates the political strategy behind the entire
effort.
V. What Should Be Read Instead: The Marxist Tradition
Against Demoralisation
Despite Serge’s discouraging
moralism, the Marxist tradition remains robust. Trotsky’s My Life, as noted by
David North in a recent article, is “an enduring contribution to Marxism and
world literature." Works such as In Defence of Marxism and The Revolution
Betrayed provide essential theoretical frameworks for interpreting Stalinism as
a counterrevolutionary bureaucracy rather than as a continuation of Bolshevism.
Despite its centrist biases,
Deutscher’s trilogy is grounded in careful historical scholarship rather than
existential doubt. Pierre Broué’s biography remains the most comprehensive
historical account of Trotsky’s life. All these works approach the subject from
a perspective rooted in historical materialism, unlike the despairing
self-examination of a defeated thinker.
Conclusion: Serge’s Biography as a Political Warning
Serge’s biography “tells us more about Serge’s own political
disintegration than about the life and enduring importance of Leon Trotsky.”
While this is accurate, the political meaning extends beyond that. "Life
and Death of Leon Trotsky" by Serge is not just a flawed book; it symbolises
a wider trend: the decline of parts of the intelligentsia from Marxism in
response to historical setbacks. It serves as a warning of the consequences
when revolutionary ideals shift to moralism, when in-depth historical analysis
gives way to existential uncertainty, and when the class struggle is replaced
by a focus on the “soul.”
The task today is not to rehabilitate Serge, but to
understand the political forces that shaped him—and to reject the use of his
writings as a weapon against the revolutionary legacy of Leon Trotsky and the
program of the Fourth International.
