Lenin
**Lenin did not invent communism**—that originated primarily with Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels—but he turned Marxist theory into a disciplined, successful revolutionary force in Russia and then a model for movements worldwide. ### Early radicalization and organizing Lenin (born Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov in 1870) was radicalized in part by the 1887 execution of his older brother Alexander for involvement in a plot to assassinate Tsar Alexander III. The family was socially ostracized, and Lenin immersed himself in radical literature, including Marx, declaring himself a Marxist around 1889–1890. In the mid-1890s he moved to St. Petersburg, organized Marxist study and workers’ circles, and helped found the Union of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class. He was arrested in 1895 and exiled to Siberia (where he married fellow revolutionary Nadezhda Krupskaya). After his release he went abroad and co-founded the underground newspaper *Iskra* (“The Spark”) to unify s...