First exile of Trotsky

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This article is part of a series about Leon Trotsky
Personal Childhood and family Train House Museum Russian political activities First exile Russian Revolution of 1905 Treaty of Brest-Litovsk Russian Civil War Trade-union debate Kronstadt rebellion Scissors Crisis Deposition Case of the Anti-Soviet "Bloc of Rightists and Trotskyites" American Committee for the Defense of Leon Trotsky Dewey Commission Assassination perpetrator Political ideology Leninism Democratic centralism Trotskyism orthodox Anti-Stalinist left Soviet democracy Worker's control Affiliations Left Opposition United Opposition Fourth International Bibliography Our Political Tasks Our Revolution 1905 The Permanent Revolution and Results and Prospects Terrorism and Communism Trotsky's Military Writings Literature and Revolution New Course Lessons of October Towards Socialism or Capitalism? Leon Trotsky on China My Life The Permanent Revolution History of the Russian Revolution The Revolution Betrayed The Stalin School of Falsification Their Morals and Ours: The class foundations of moral practice The Transitional Program Stalin: An Appraisal of the Man and His Influence Writings of Leon Trotsky The Spanish Revolution, 1931-1939 The Struggle Against Fascism in Germany In Defence of Marxism
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The first exile of Trotsky was a two-year period in the life of revolutionary Leon Trotsky, that he spent in exile in the Irkutsk Governorate of the Russian empire. He was exiled by the verdict of the Odessa court for the organization of the South-Russian Workers Union. Being imprisoned and exiled from 1900 to 1902, Trotsky married and actively engaged in both self-education (which included reading the classics of Marxism) and journalistic work. Under the pseudonym "Antid Oto" Trotsky collaborated with the newspaper Vostochnoye obozreniye (Russian: Восточное обозрение, "The Eastern Review"), which published three dozen of his articles and essays, warmly accepted by the audience. During his first exile, the future Soviet People's Commissar was involved in literary studies, was writing about general issues of sociology and creativity, plus – about the themes of Siberian peasant life. Traveling between the villages of Ust-Kut, Nizhne-Ilimsk and the city of Verkholensk, Trotsky came into contact with many former and future revolutionary personalities, including Moisei Uritsky and Felix Dzerzhinsky.

The printed works of Trotsky, published even in Western Europe, as well as his public lectures in Irkutsk, attracted attention of the leaders of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) to the young revolutionary: he was escaped from the Siberian exile. As a result, Trotsky left his wife with two little daughters. After the escape, he first appeared in Vienna and then in London, where his first meeting with Vladimir Lenin – who had recently published his book "What Is To Be Done?" – took place. Historians of the 21st century believed that staying in Siberia and contacts with local revolutionaries were of great importance for shaping the political views of the future leader of the October Revolution – for "his political self-determination".