Peter Kenez (; born 1937) is a Jewish Hungarian-American historian specializing in

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

n and Eastern European history and politics.

Life

Kenez was born and grew up in Pesterzsébet,

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

Kingdom of Hungary The Kingdom of Hungary was a monarchy in Central Europe that existed for nearly a millennium, from 1000 to 1946 and was a key part of the Habsburg monarchy from 1526-1918. The Principality of Hungary emerged as a Christian kingdom upon the Coro ...

. His father was arrested in March 1944 after Operation Margarethe and deported to the

Auschwitz concentration camp Auschwitz, or Oświęcim, was a complex of over 40 Nazi concentration camps, concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) d ...

and killed. His mother fled to Budapest with him, where they survived the persecution of the Jews by the Eichmann-Kommando and the Arrow Cross Party. After the Hungarian uprising of 1956 he fled to the US. He received his PhD from

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

under the advisor Richard Pipes. He has taught at the

University of California, Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of C ...

, since 1966, where he is currently Professor Emeritus. He also teaches courses on Soviet cinema and an interdisciplinary course on the Holocaust with literature professor Murray Baumgarten.

Books

*''Before the Uprising: Hungary under Communism, 1949–1956''. Cambridge University Press, 2022. *''The Coming of the Holocaust: From Antisemitism to Genocide'', Cambridge University Press, 2013. *''Hungary from the Nazis to the Soviets: The Establishment of the Communist Regime in Hungary, 1944–1948'', New York,

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press was the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted a letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it was the oldest university press in the world. Cambridge University Press merged with Cambridge Assessme ...

, 2006. *''Cinema and Soviet Society from the Revolution to the Death of Stalin'', London and New York, I.B. Tauris, 2001. *''A History of the Soviet Union from the Beginning to the End'', New York, Cambridge University Press, 1999; 2nd ed., 2006. *''Varieties of Fear: Growing Up Jewish under Nazism and Communism'', Washington, American University Press, 1995. *''Cinema and Soviet Society, 1917–1953'', Cambridge University Press, 1992. *''Bolshevik Culture: Experiment and Order in the Russian Revolution'', edited with Abbott Gleason and Richard Stites, Indiana University Press, 1985. *''The Birth of the Propaganda State: Soviet Methods of Mass Mobilization, 1917–1929'', Cambridge et New York, Cambridge University Press, 1985. *''Civil War in South Russia, 1919–1920: The Defeat of the Whites'', Berkeley,

University of California Press The University of California Press, otherwise known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish scholarly and scientific works by faculty ...

, 1977. *''Civil War in South Russia, 1918: The First Year of the Volunteer Army'', Berkeley, University of California Press, 1971.Reviews of ''Civil War in South Russia, 1918: The First Year of the Volunteer Army'': ; ; ; ; ; ;

References

External links

* Historians of Russia Living people Harvard University alumni University of California, Santa Cruz faculty 1937 births {{Historian-stub