Cubo-futurist rendering of Trotsky, uncredited (probably Annenkov, 1922)

Trotskiana

1920s Trotsky memorabilia

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Back in 2008, Mansur Mirovalev wrote a piece for NBC News on a curious leftover from the late Cold War era:

The Soviet Union may be in the dustbin of history, but there’s one place the socialist utopia lives on: cyberspace.

And no, Mirovalev wasn’t talking about this blog, or Richard Seymour’s Lenin’s Tomb, Roland Boer’s Stalin’s Moustache, or Martin Gittins’ magnificent Kosmograd website.

He had something quite different in mind.

Namely:

Sixteen years after the superpower’s collapse, websites ending in the Soviet “.su” domain name have been rising — registrations increased 45 percent this year alone. Bloggers, entrepreneurs and die-hard communists are all part of a small but growing online community resisting repeated efforts to extinguish the online Soviet outpost.

That’s right — you can have your very own Soviet Union domain name. And cheap, too. Most go for under $50. Get ’em while they’re hot!

But the story doesn’t end there. Douglas La Rocca, a fellow member of Platypus and an enterprising chap in general, has bought up the rights to trotsky.suTrotsky [dot] Soviet Union. At first I didn’t believe him, because I figured that one of the countless Trotsky sects would have beaten him to it. But sure enough, he got it.

In fact, that’s where he posted his excellent poster design for Platypus’ upcoming International Convention (register here!). Maybe someday, if he’s strapped for cash, he could always auction off the site name to the highest sectarian bidder. For now, though, I think he’ll hang onto it.

Anyway, in honor of his recent acquisition, here’s a collection of rare memorabilia — portraits, sculptures, photomontages, and even coffee mugs — representing the Bolshevik revolutionary leader Leon Trotsky, all from the 1920s.  Enjoy!

Gallery

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