The Silent Prophet (Works of Joseph Roth) - Softcover

"The narrative is succinct and skillful; the lone is that of a masterwork . . . This is a work of imagination."

A novel one would not wish to be without...Roth is a very fine writer indeed. (Angela Carter, "The Guardian")

Based on his own observations during an extended stay in Moscow in the winter of 1926, The Silent Prophet is Roth’s vivid attempt to explain the Russian Revolution and its betrayal by exposing the personal motivations of its leaders. The illegitimate and rootless Friedrich Kargan—the Trotsky figure—goes compulsorily but willingly into exile in Siberia after openly defying the coldly amoral Savelli—the novel’s Stalin figure. Written at the height of speculation about Trotsky’s fate, The Silent Prophet is a brilliant portrayal of revolutionary idealism-turned-cynicism.