Catherine Merridale Explained

Catherine Merridale
Honorific Suffix:	FBA
Birth Date:	1959 10, df=y
Nationality:	British
Citizenship:	United Kingdom
Alma Mater:	King's College, Cambridge University of Birmingham
Thesis Title:	The Communist Party in Moscow 1925-1932
Thesis Year:	1987
Discipline:	History

Catherine Anne Merridale, FBA (born 12 October 1959) is a British writer and historian with a special interest in Russian history.

Early life and education

Merridale was born on 12 October 1959 to Philip and Anne Merridale. She was educated at Andover Grammar School, a state school in Andover, Hampshire, and at Cricklade College, a further education college that is also in Andover. She studied history at King's College, Cambridge, graduating with a first class Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree in 1982. She continued her studies at the Centre for Russian and East European Studies of the University of Birmingham, and completed her Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree in 1987.^[1] Her doctoral thesis was titled "The Communist Party in Moscow 1925-1932".^[2]

Academic career

Merridale was Professor of Contemporary History at Queen Mary, University of London from 2004 to 2014. She has been a senior research fellow at the Institute of Historical Research, University of London, since her retirement from full-time academia in 2014.^[3]

Research interests

In an interview with The Independent, Merridale recalls how she became interested in Russia and its past. She began studying Russian in school and first visited the country at the age of 18. She said of her first impression of Russia, "Going from the then ghastly Soviet airport, everything in Moscow was grey and cold and hard. Suddenly in the middle of the city were these golden cupolas and enormous redbrick walls with peculiar swallowtail battlement pattern that didn’t look Russian, but did at the same time."^[4] When she began work on her higher degrees, Merridale spent a year living in Moscow and observing the changes occurring during that time.^[4] In another interview with Waterstones.com, Merridale summarises her perspective of Russian history, "my message is that we have to take each generation of Russian leaders as they are and not keep assuming that Russia is fated to follow a special path and will always be the same. That there is a Russian destiny."^[5]

Later career

Having retired from her academic career, Merridale became a freelance writer in 2014. She has written for the London Review of Books, the New Statesman, The Independent, The Guardian, and the Literary Review. She has also contributed to BBC Radio.^{[6] [7]} The author has spoken out publicly about the issues of publishing books in the field of history. There is much more pressure to publish shorter articles than full-length books, a "great shame" according to Merridale, author of multiple history books.^[8]

Selected works

• Book: Merridale, Catherine . Moscow Politics and the Rise of Stalin: The Communist Party in the Capital, 1925-32 . New York. St. Martin's Press . 1990 . 0312047991 . 21337606.
• Book: Merridale, Catherine . Night of Stone: Death and Memory in Twentieth-Century Russia . New York. Viking . 2001 . 0670894745 . 44573540.
• Book: Merridale, Catherine . Culture and Combat Motivation . London. Sage Publications . 2006 . 67636955.
• Book: Merridale , Catherine . Ivan's War: life and death in the Red Army, 1939-1945 . New York . Metropolitan Books . 2006 . 0805074554 . 60671899 .
• Book: Merridale , Catherine . Red fortress: history and illusion in the Kremlin . New York . Metropolitan Books, Henry Volt and Company . 2013 . 978-0805086805 . 827256860 . registration .
• Book: Merridale, Catherine . Lenin on the Train . UK. Penguin . 2016 . 978-0141979939 . 944462944.

Honours

• UK Heinemann Award for Literature for Night of Stone^{[7] [9] [10]}
• New York Military Affairs Symposium's Arthur Goodzeit Prize for best book on Military History for Ivan's War^{[1] [11] [12]}
• Pushkin House Book Prize for Red Fortress^{[13] [4]}
• Wolfson History Prize for Red Fortress^[14]
• She was elected a Fellow of the British Academy, the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences, in 2016.^[15]

External links

• Author's Website
• Merridale discusses Red Fortress for the London School of Economics and Political Science and recorded on 9 October 2013 in the Hong Kong Theatre of Clement House
• https://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/09/books/review/09fitzpatrick.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 New York Times review of Ivan's War from April 2006

Notes and References

1. Web site: Professor Catherine Merridale. Queen Mary University of London, School of History. 15 September 2014.
2. Anne. Merridale, Catherine. The Communist Party in Moscow 1925-1932. E-Thesis Online Service. The British Library Board. 17 January 2018. 1987. Ph.D .
3. Web site: Professor Catherine Merridale. Institute of Historical Research. University of London. 17 January 2018.
4. Web site: Author Catherine Merridale wins Pushkin Prize for her biography of the Kremlin. The Independent. May 2014 . 6 October 2014.
5. Web site: Pushkin House Book Prize: Catherine Merridale. Waterstones.com. 6 October 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20141009191833/http://www.waterstones.com/blog/2014/04/pushkin-house-book-prize-catherine-merridale/. 9 October 2014. dead.
6. Book: Merridale. Catherine. Red Fortress. 2013. Metropolitan Books. New York. 9780805086805. registration.
7. Book: Merridale. Catherine. Ivan's War. 2006. Metropolitan Books. New York. 9780805074550. 1.
8. Web site: Furness. Hannah. Serious history books will soon become a rarity, Wolfson History Prize winner says. The Telegraph. 3 June 2014 . 6 October 2014.
9. Web site: Red Fortress: the secret heart of Russia's history. The London School of Economics and Political Science. 18 September 2014.
10. Web site: Books by Catherine Merridale. Kirkus Reviews. 6 October 2014.
11. Web site: Winners of The Arthur Goodzeit Book Award. New York Military Affairs Symposium. 18 September 2014.
12. Web site: Catherine Merridale. HeadRead. 6 October 2014. https://web.archive.org/web/20141009023850/http://headread.ee/?page_id=4255&lang=en. 9 October 2014. dead.
13. http://static.squarespace.com/static/52f75de8e4b0ec7646d0a50f/t/5373bf8fe4b0ad082231bcef/1400094607018/PHRBP%20-%20i%20(precise)%20-%202%2005%2014.pdf
14. Web site: Serious history books will soon become a rarity, Wolfson History Prize winner says . 3 June 2014 . Telegraph . 2014-06-13.
15. Web site: Professor Catherine Merridale. British Academy. 17 January 2018.