Political Tourists

For Socialists and many liberals, the Soviet Union of the 1920s-1940s was the site of the great Socialist Experiment. Most Australians who travelled there wrote about their extraordinary experiences, and the recent opening of the Soviet archives gave access to the Soviets' reactions to their visitors. Collecting the research of leading historians and writers, Political Tourists explores Soviet tourism through figures such as Eric Ashby, RM Crawford, Reg Ellery, Neill Greenwood, Esmonde Higgins, Katharine Susannah Prichard, Betty Roland and Jessie Street. Drawing on both Australian and Soviet archives, this is a unique insight into the Soviet experience in the 1920s-1940s.

Sheila Fitzpatrick is Bernadotte E. Schmitt Professor in Modern Russian History at the University of Chicago. Her recent publications include Tear off the Masks! Identity and Imposture in Twentieth-Century Russia (2005) and Against the Grain: Brian Fitzpatrick and Manning Clark in Australian History and Politics (edited with Stuart Macintyre, 2007).Dr Carolyn Rasmussen is a public historian and Fellow in the School of Historical Studies at the University of Melbourne. Her published work ranges across the history of Victorian public institutions, the history of science and technology, labour history, education history, the involvement of women therein, and biography.