Felipe Arraño’s Reviews > Age of Assassins > Status Update

Nihilist originally had meant “a person lacking in education and cultural refinement” (p. 72). Nihilism’s early origins belonged to the mid-to-late 1850s, in Russia in the ferment created by the defeat of the Crimean War and the hopes produced by the accession of the new Tsar (p. 72). Lincoln’s murder inspired Hell, a small and secret revolutionary group, where Dmitry Karakozov planned to kill the Tsar; he failed but the Tsar panicked and the White Terror began (p. 73). Nechaev with the support of Bakunin launched a propaganda campaign aiming to the revolution (p. 80). Nechaev pamphlets were too outrageous even for those within the movement, some who considered him as double agent, contemplating to send assassins to kill him (p. 81). Nechaev went back to Russia in 1869 and started creating a revolutionary cell, one of the members (Ivanov) criticized Nechaev’s orders and dictatorial manner; Nechaev decided to kill him; days later the police started to hunt Nechaev (p. 82-83). Bakunin was ready to break with the extreme fanatic Nechaev (p. 85). Nechaev is tried in 1873 and sentenced to 20 years’ hard labor in Siberia (p. 86). Vera Zasulich was involved with revolutionary politics, she might even slept with Nechaev (p. 88). She shot General Fedor Trepov (p. 91). The verdict of the trial was not guilty, the jury and the people consider her as an heroine who had attacked illicit autocracy in the spirit of righteousness (p. 92). She escaped tho Switzerland (p. 93). All this trial showed that legal norms did not operate in Russia (p. 93). Her life after the assassination attempt was a frustrating one, still on the run (p. 94). Zasulich was an inspiration to crime rather than to revolution (p. 95). Prople’s Will succeeded in killing the Tsar Alexander II, but the assassins handed on only an inspiration (p. 100). Nechaev died in prison in November 1882, he was 35 years old, and spent 8 in close confinement, darkness and chains (p. 102).