Trotsky by Rick Geary

Trotsky is the newest biographical graphic novel written and drawn by Rick Geary, who has done other notable bio-graphic novels on Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, J. Edgar Hoover, Jack the Ripper, and Lizzy Borden. Rick Geary's biographical subject matters often are the victims or are the cause of horrific violence, but Geary always shows this in a non sensationalistic fashion, while at the same time not shying away from what actually happened. Rick Geary, in his unique narrative writing voice and illustrative style, also manages to compress a large time period of history into his graphic novels without them feeling rushed or as if he edited certain events.

Trotsky, is of course, one of the central architects of the Russian Revolution in the early 1900s, was an avid follower of the ideas of Karl Marx (so was of course an opponent of Capitalism), whose biggest opponent throughout his life was the other large figure of Russia at the time, Lenin. Rick Geary, in Trotsky, fleshes out the life of Leon Trotsky (his name at birth was Lev Davidovich Bronstein), showing that he was more than just one of the faces of communism who had to deal with many instances of personal tragedy and I was especially interested in reading that Trotsky's life path crossed with Frida, the legendary artist of Mexico. Trotsky is a hardcover graphic novel published by Hill and Wang and I think serves as a great introduction to the cartooning of Rick Geary for those who aren't already familiar with him.