The Britannica Guide to Russia

Russia can claim to be one of the most grievously misunderstood countries of the early twenty-first century. A vast land mass, with a harsh climate and declining population, the country boasts as rich a history and as glorious a culture as any in the world. Yet the upheavals it experienced in the twentieth century - from the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 to the largely peaceful reversal of that revolution before the century was out - left the country and its people exhausted, while striving to catch up with a European and global mainstream that had largely passed them by.