Welcome to Russian History Retold.

Episode 303, Lenin, who was he really?

Last time, we finished the series on the great game between Great Britain and Russia. Today we will

attempt to paint a picture of who Vladimir Lenin really was. Not just his rhetoric or actions, but the person who began his life in Sembirsk as Vladimir

Ilage Lianov. I'm going to try to show different size of Lenin through the works that I will lean on.

My primary sources for today's podcast include the book I introduced and to this day one of my most popular episodes

Number 216 Before Evil, an interview with author Brandon Gautier about young Lenin and Stalin.

Also, I'll be using the monumental book, Lenin, a biography by Robert Service.

Now on the other side, I want to use a book that's much more sympathetic to the man.

It's known as a People's History of the Russian Revolution by Neil Faulkner.

We begin with Vladimir Uylliano's birth on April 22, 1870, and Strelskaya Yulitza Simbirsk to Ilia Nikolayev Lianov and Maria Alexandrovna Blank.

To understand who Vladimir was to become, we need to learn a bit more about his childhood and parental influences.

While Eilia was a devout follower of Russian Orthodoxy, Maria was born a Lutheran, yet yet not a practicing Christian. This would be something that would

influence all of her six children who survived childhood.

Lening's father, Ilia, was an interesting character in his own right. His father, Nikolai Vassilievich Uyannov, was a former serf whose ethnicity is somewhat unclear as he may have been

Chuvash or Vinian Russian or Kalmik. His mother was half Russian and half Kalmyk. After graduating from Hazan's University

Department of Physics and Mathematics in 1854, Iliya would go on to teach mathematics and physics at Penza Institute for the

Duvoreen and later at a gymnasium and a school for women in Nizhny Novgorod. From there he would be appointed

inspector of public schools in the Simbirsk-Gubnaya and later promoted to the rank of active state counselor, giving them the privilege of hereditary

nobility and accompanied by the order of Saint Vladimir third class.

Both parents were monarchists and what may seem somewhat contradictory

they were considered liberal conservatives.

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