Talk:Fanny Kaplan

stuff

I posted an entry on Fanya Kaplan, the woman that attempted to assassinate Lenin. Being as her real name is Russian, there is some dispute on how it should be transcribed into English. I have seen it as both Fanny and Fanya. A Google search shows that Fanny is more popular by about two to one, but Fanya seems to appear much more frequently in the scholarly works as opposed to the general ones. In addition, Mikkalai, who unlike me actually speaks Russian, says that Fanny is the more accurate transcription. I'm throwing this one to the consensus of the crowd. 1430 EST 30 January 2004 MK

I'm not vouching for the correct spelling. In Soviet texts she was called Fanny, but there is no 100% sure data about her real name. Other hypotheses are Feiga and Dora (the latter gave rise to a ridiculous version that Lenin was shot by "Fanya and her syster Dora"). Mikkalai 23:27, 1 Feb 2004 (UTC)

The Russian-language Wikipedia gives it as "Фанни Ефимовна Каплан (Фейга Хаимовна Ройдман)". The standard transliteration of this is "Fanni Efimovna Kaplan (Feĭga Khaimovna Roĭdman)". That means her Yiddish first name was Feyge (spelled Feĭga in Russian), and she was also called by the more European-sounding name Fanni, and her father's name was presumably Khaim in Yiddish and Efim in Russian. Her father's last name is given as Roĭdman.

1/ I took out the bit about her joining the Right SRs and have simply left it as her joining the SR. (The Right SR only existed after the October revolution when the SR Party split).

2/ I have changed the sentace regarding all parties expect the Bolsheviks being banned. The original implied that they were banned when the Constituent Assembly was closed. At this time only the Kadets were illegal. The Right SRs, Anarchists, Mensheviks and Left SRs were all banned in subsequent months. All of them had to some degree or another taken up arms against the Bolsheviks. The reasons why each of them did so are complex and best dealt with elsewhere.

3/ I took out the whole paragraph about the assasination of the head of the Petrograd and subsequent suppression of the SR. This misses out alot of other more important info (i.e. the Left SR 'uprising' in Moscow in July, the Left SR assasination of German Ambassador Count Mirbach)

None of which has to do with the Right SR who were already banned by this point.

Thank you very much for your corrections. Nevertheless I have to restore the last paragraph, since generally the two events are considered to be immediate triggers of Red Terror. Your comments will be valuable addition to the Red Terror article. Also, please feel free to edit the restored paragraph, but IMO it must be kept in some form. Otherwise the impression is that there were no consequences, which is clearly wrong. Mikkalai 01:45, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I think that the new text about Lenin and his theory that the soviets were a valid alternative government is somewhat biased. But I'll leave it there for now so others have an opportunity to read and discuss it. MK2 04:44, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I've noticed in both this article and one on the Red Terror that Fanny Kaplan is authoritatively said to have been Lenin's attacker. There is actually some debate about this. Without going too into it, two main points off the top of my head: 1. Kaplan was quickly and rather quietly executed rather than made to suffer public humiliation for propaganda purposes. Though it may be argued that this tendency had not fully developed in the Soviet Union at the time and that the Bolsheviks weren't necessarily powerful enough to attempt such a thing, one must wonder why the Cheka, a secret police force rivaled only by the Gestapo in its barbarity, was unable to pry the names of Kaplan's coconspirators out of her and, indeed, gave up on doing so so quickly. Some say that this was because she was a scapegoat. Possibly the assassin's real identity would have embarassed the Bolsheviks (i.e. a worker or one of their own) so Kaplan was chosen because she was a member of a then unfavorable political party. Surely, the arrest of an SR for Lenin's attempted assassination allowed the Bolsheviks to consolidate their power even further. In this way, the event is much like the similarly disputed Reichstag Fire in 1933. 2. My second, far less heady reason is that Kaplan had terrible eyesight. It is doubtful that she would have been able to fire a gun with any accuracy.

1. You are right: at these times there was no habit of public trials at these times. You are wrong: even most barbaric secret police cannot pry coconspirators, if there were none. Do you know them today? Also, you was not reading the article carefully: they did not need any coconspirators: all esers were rounded up, (Also, your opinion about whose barbarity was best is naive. If you think that English in their colonies worked in white gloves while suppressing rebellions, it is fine with me, but I will chuckle.) 2. She was shooting from close range. And she didn't kill him, by the way. Mikkalai 07:57, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting that the content of the page be changed to indicate that Kaplan DID NOT shoot Lenin (though I believe that to be the case.) I am suggesting that it be mentioned that there is some question about Kaplan's guilt. Thank you. -Church of England 21:42 4/22/05 (this is my first time doing this so I'm probably not following the etiquette. I apologize. I have no idea how to do this properly. I'll check back soon. Please let me know how to properly leave comments like this.)

the basic etiquette is that wikipedia is not a discussion group. Your opinion has no place in the article: see wikipedia:no original research. See also User talk:Church of england for the very basic reading suggestions about editing in wikipedia. If you have serious, authoritative sources that discuss these issues, you are free to present them as opinions of experts, like, "Professor Drillenhengst argues that...". Mikkalai 07:57, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Kaplan not executed in 1918?

According to Victor Serge in his book "From Lenin to Stalin" he said (referring to Dora Kaplan) "And Lenin insisted that she should not be shot; although her execution was announced, I have reasons for believing that it did not take place and that Dora Kaplan was still alive many years later." 4.131.86.187 09:19, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Date of birth

This entry gives her date of birth as 1883, while many other Wikipedias, also Russian, state it to be 1890. Also other Russian texts describe her as being 27 in 1918. What is true? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 193.212.171.26 (talk) 10:59, 16 January 2007 (UTC).

Recommended source for use in revising this article

Someone needs to thoroughly revise this Wikipedia article, because the information in it is seriously outdated. I would do it, but I don't have time. The most up-to-date scholarly article about the 1918 assassination attempt on Lenin that I can think of right now is "The 1918 Attempt on the Life of Lenin: A New Look at the Evidence," by Semion Lyandres, in the journal Slavic Review, Vol. 48, No. 3 (Autumn, 1989), pp. 432-448.