From Revolutionary Petrograd to Post-revolutionary Emigration

Abstract

Abstract The article explores the impact of the revolutionary events of 1917 on the personal life and professional work of Georgii (George) Vernadskii, who later became a professor at Yale University and one of the founders of Russian Studies in the USA. The trajectories of Vernadskii’s professional and political activity in 1917–1921 seemed to be on a collision course. Revolutionary events caught him at the beginning of a successful academic career, which was jeopardized by his involvement in politics, an involvement that continued to plague him despite his eventual attempts to “quit politics.” Yet, an analysis of his writings in these years and his later notes about that period indicate that, in Vernadskii’s case, history and politics were deeply interwoven.