Quiz: What Is To Be Done?

All 50 questions. A perfect score earns the gold medal; 80% earns silver.

1. 1. Besides a collective propagandist and agitator, what else is a newspaper, according to the passage Lenin quotes?

   A collective organiser A collective chronicler A collective conscience A collective bookkeeper
2. 2. What order did Iskra respond to by calling on the workers to go to the aid of the students?

   The drafting of 183 students into the army The closing of the universities in Kiev and Petersburg The expulsion of foreign students The ban on student societies
3. 3. Who alone, according to chapter IV, can conduct the struggle against the political police?

   The liberal and radical intelligentsia The trade unions The broad masses of the workers Professional revolutionists
4. 4. Which German leaders does Lenin cite as men promoted from the ranks of the working class?

   Liebknecht and Mehring Kautsky and Bernstein Lassalle and Schweitzer Bebel and Auer
5. 5. What does Lenin call the only serious organisational principle for the movement’s active workers?

   Unconditional obedience by every member to the decisions of each annual congress A loose federation of local committees, each autonomous and self-governing in its own area Election of all officers by the members and full publicity for every decision taken Strict secrecy, strict selection and professional training
6. 6. How does the conclusion answer the question “What is to be done?”

   Liquidate the Third Period Return to the spirit of the First Period Unite with the League abroad Prepare the armed insurrection
7. 7. At the “Unity” Congress, which word did Krichevsky seize on as a slip betraying Iskra’s evil intentions?

   “Catch” “Split” “Purge” “Trap”
8. 8. In Lenin’s parable about legal organisations, what is “not our business”?

   To grow wheat in flower-pots To pull up the tares To expose the Zubatov societies To prepare reapers
9. 9. What common root does Lenin find for Economism and terrorism?

   Lack of funds Subservience to spontaneity The influence of German revisionism Contempt for the peasantry
10. 10. To bring political knowledge to the workers, where must the Social-Democrats go?

    Abroad, to the émigré centres Among the peasants first of all, then the workers Only among the factory workers Among all classes of the population
11. 11. Which trade-union leader does Lenin contrast with Wilhelm Liebknecht?

    Robert Knight of the Boiler Makers John Burns of the London dock strike of 1889 Tom Mann of the Amalgamated Engineers Keir Hardie of the miners
12. 12. Whose article on the Austrian party programme does Lenin quote on socialist consciousness?

    Max Adler Rosa Luxemburg Karl Kautsky Franz Mehring
13. 13. Which of these does Lenin not name among the “circles of heroes” of the past?

    Khalturin Alexeyev Plekhanov Zhelyabov
14. 14. What, according to Lenin, does “freedom of criticism” really mean?

    Freedom of members to recall their leaders Freedom of the press under the autocracy Freedom of scientific research in universities Freedom for an opportunist tendency in Social-Democracy
15. 15. From where, according to Lenin, must Social-Democratic consciousness be brought to the workers?

    From the factory From the peasantry From without From the trade unions
16. 16. What three sides of the struggle does Engels say the German workers combine?

    Theoretical, political, practical economic Trade-union, cooperative and parliamentary work Legal, illegal and armed Local, national and international solidarity
17. 17. To what does Lenin compare the newspaper in a building under construction?

    The architect’s plan The scaffolding The foundations The roof
18. 18. According to the witness B-v, how long could a young agitator usually carry on his work before arrest?

    About ten years A few days Four, five, or six months Two or three years at the most
19. 19. What does the word “khvostism” come from?

    The name of an Economist editor in Kiev A Russian word for a strike-breaker A German word for a compromise Khvost, Russian for “tail”
20. 20. Complete Lenin’s sentence: “Without a revolutionary theory there can be no…”

    victory lasting working-class victory revolutionary movement revolutionary party
21. 21. In Lenin’s image of the compact group on a difficult path, where do some members want to go?

    Into the marsh Into the forest Back to the river Over the mountain
22. 22. When is the preface dated?

    May 1901 August 1903 December 1900 February 1902
23. 23. What, according to Lenin, is “the whole art of politics”?

    Uniting all the opposition parties behind a single democratic programme of reform Winning the confidence of the masses before putting forward any demand at all Waiting for the right moment and striking the decisive blow Finding the link in the chain most important now and clinging to it
24. 24. What historical service does Lenin credit Lassalle with?

    Leading the party through all twelve years of the Anti-Socialist Laws under Bismarck Drafting the Erfurt Programme on which all the German Social-Democrats united Diverting the German labour movement from progressive trade unionism and co-operation Founding the First International together with Marx at St Martin’s Hall in London
25. 25. Which article was the pamphlet originally meant to develop?

    “The Split in the League of Russian Social-Democrats Abroad” “The Autocracy and the Zemstvo” “A Conversation with Defenders of Economism” “Where to Begin,” in Iskra No. 4
26. 26. According to chapter II, what kind of consciousness can the working class develop exclusively by its own effort?

    Social-Democratic consciousness National consciousness No consciousness at all Trade-union consciousness
27. 27. What was one reason, given in the preface, for the pamphlet’s late appearance?

    Lenin’s arrest and exile to Siberia after the Petersburg trial The censor’s seizure of the first manuscript at the frontier in 1901 The attempt to unite the organisations abroad in June 1901 A quarrel with Plekhanov over the title
28. 28. What three features should the workers’ organisations for the economic struggle have?

    Legal, national and formally affiliated to the party committees Secret, small and centralised By trade, as wide as possible, as public as conditions allow Organised by locality, elected, and led by trusted intellectuals of the party
29. 29. How does Lenin summarise the political line of the Credo?

    Let the workers wage the economic struggle and the intelligentsia join the liberals in politics Let the workers seize political power at once through a general strike called by all the committees Let the émigrés lead and the committees obey Let the party be organised by trades rather than localities
30. 30. What two conditions does Lenin say “broad principles of democracy” presuppose?

    Full publicity and election to all functions A written constitution and courts Freedom of the press and of assembly for all members Universal suffrage and a parliament
31. 31. Behind whose back does Lenin say he will try to hide after writing “We ought to dream!”?

    Herzen’s Pisarev’s Chernyshevsky’s Plekhanov’s
32. 32. Complete the paraphrased epigram: “Give us an organisation of revolutionists, and we shall…”

    free the peasants! overturn the whole of Russia! conquer the world! build socialism in one country!
33. 33. What does Lenin say the “spontaneous element” represents in essence?

    Bourgeois ideology The influence of the intelligentsia The absence of all consciousness Consciousness, but in an embryonic form
34. 34. Whose “two prospects,” outlined in 1897, does Lenin say contained all later disputes like a plant in the seed?

    Kautsky’s G. V. Plekhanov’s Martov’s P. B. Axelrod’s
35. 35. To which stratum does Lenin say Marx and Engels themselves belonged?

    The industrial proletariat of England The bourgeois intelligentsia The urban artisans The landed nobility of the Rhineland
36. 36. What should the Social-Democrat’s ideal be, rather than a trade-union secretary?

    A socialist member of parliament A government factory inspector A professional journalist A tribune of the people
37. 37. Lenin asserts that it is far more difficult to catch which of these?

    A committee than a circle Ten wise men than a hundred fools A hundred fools than ten wise men A worker than a student
38. 38. Which years does Lenin give for the first period of Russian Social-Democracy?

    1884 to 1894 1861 to 1881 1894 to 1898 1898 to 1902
39. 39. How should the revolution be regarded, according to Lenin?

    As a gradual process of reforms won from the autocracy As a single act As a series of more or less powerful outbreaks As a military coup
40. 40. Which formula of Martynov’s does Lenin attack throughout chapter III?

    “Freedom of criticism” “The workers for the workers” “To give the economic struggle itself a political character” “The movement is everything, the final goal nothing”
41. 41. From which work of Engels does Lenin quote the long passage on the three sides of the struggle?

    His 1888 foreword to the pamphlet Ludwig Feuerbach Anti-Dühring His introduction to The Peasant War in Germany The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844
42. 42. Which two German party resolutions does Lenin say rejected Bernsteinism?

    Hanover and Lübeck Dresden and Jena Erfurt and Gotha Halle and Eisenach
43. 43. Which of these is not one of Lenin’s three reasons why theory matters especially for Russian Social-Democrats?

    The party is only in the process of formation Its national tasks have never confronted any other socialist party The movement is essentially international Russia already has a strong legal labour press
44. 44. What happened to the first Rabocheye Dyelo prepared by the St. Petersburg group in 1895?

    It was banned by the censor after its first issue It was printed abroad in Geneva and smuggled in by students It merged with Rabochaya Mysl after one issue It was seized by the gendarmes
45. 45. How did Rabocheye Dyelo define tactics, according to chapter II?

    As the art of combating the political police As the choice between reform and revolution As a process of growth of party tasks, which grow with the party As a plan of campaign drawn up in advance by the central organ
46. 46. Who, according to chapter I, “has provided an excellent example of practical Bernsteinism”?

    Jaurès Millerand Georg von Vollmar Guesde
47. 47. What “old song” does the working-class revolutionary see behind the Economists’ talk of palpable results?

    Bread, peace and land Adding a kopeck to the ruble Eight hours’ work, eight hours’ rest A fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work
48. 48. Following Plekhanov, how does Lenin distinguish the propagandist from the agitator?

    The propagandist calls for concrete actions in the factories; the agitator explains the theory The propagandist works legally; the agitator illegally The propagandist gives many ideas to a few; the agitator a few ideas to a mass The propagandist writes for the workers’ circles; the agitator for the liberal intelligentsia
49. 49. What was the title of Nadezhdin’s pamphlet attacking the newspaper plan?

    Two Congresses Where to Begin The Eve of the Revolution A Vademecum for the Editors
50. 50. What choice of ideology does Lenin say faces the workers’ movement?

    Religious or secular Bourgeois or socialist, with no middle course Liberal or conservative, as circumstances dictate National or international, according to local conditions