Karl Kautsky and Eduard Bernstein

[Robert Chandler]

Dear all,

Grossman is writing about the generation of Russian Communists who perished
in 1937.  He says that ‘The first to be destroyed were the fanatics, the
destroyers of the old world, those whose devotion to the Revolution was
embodied, above all, in the hatred they bore to its enemies.’  He goes on to
say that они  ненавидели  Каутского, Макдональда; они не читали Бернштейна,
но он им казался  ужасен, хотя их судьба вторила его словам: цель - ничто,
движение - все. (oni ne chitali Bernshteina, no on im kazalsya uzhasen,
khotya ikh sud’ba vtorila ego slovam: tsel’ - nichto, dvizhenie – vse.)
 
I do not understand what Grossman is saying about their fate.  I understand
that Bernstein’s own words respresent his espousal of a gradualist,
reformist, non-revolutionary approach to socialism, but I am not sure in
what way the fate of the revolutionaries echos these words.

My draft translation is ‘They hated Karl Kautsky and Ramsay MacDonald.  They
did not read Bernstein, but to them he seemed an appalling figure, even
though their eventual fate was to echo his words, ‘The goal is nothing,
movement is everything.’  As you see, I have added the word ‘eventual’,
thinking that Grossman may just be making an uncharacteristically poor joke
about the fact that they ended up travelling a long way, i.e. to Siberia.
But does anyone have any more fruitful understanding of this passage?

This is probably unnecessary, but, in case it is any help, here are my draft
footnotes:

Karl Kautsky (1854—1938) was the leading Marxist thinker after the death of
Friedrich Engels, who was a close friend, and a leading figure in the German
Social Democratic Party.  Lenin considered Kautsky a ‘renegade’ and Kautsky,
for his part, castigated Lenin for having laid the foundations for a new
dictatorship.  

James Ramsay MacDonald (1866—1937) was one of the founding figures of the
British Labour Party and the first Labour Prime Minister. His decision to
form a coalition with the Conservatives in 1931, a so-called ‘National
Government’ has always been seen by the Left as an act of betrayal.

Eduard Bernstein (1850—1932) was another important figure in the German
Social Democratic Party. He was the founder of the reformist,
non-revolutionary current of socialism known as ‘evolutionary socialism’.

Best Wishes,

R.

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