Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 1924 and of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1924. Under his administration, Russia, and later the Soviet Union, became a one-party socialist state governed by the Communist Party. Ideologically a Marxist, his developments to the ideology are called Leninism.

Russia in the Shadows is a book by H. G. Wells published early in 1921, which includes a series of articles previously printed in The Sunday Express in connection with Wells's second visit to Russia (after a previous trip in January 1914 to St. Petersburg and Moscow) in September and October 1920.

During his visit to Russia he visited his old friend Maxim Gorky, whom he had first met in 1906 on a trip to the United States, and who arranged Wells's meeting with Lenin.

In a chapter (The Dreamer in the Kremlin) devoted to an interview with Lenin at the Kremlin Wells describes the leader and founder of Russian communism. Wells portrays Lenin as a pragmatic leader who "has recently stripped off the last pretence that the Russian revolution is anything more than the inauguration of an age of limitless experiment."

Vladimir Lenin:

State and Revolution

What Is to Be Done?

Imperialism: The Final Stage of Capitalism

The State and Revolution

The Three Sources and Three Component Parts of Marxism

To the Citizens of Russia!

To Workers, Soldiers, and Peasants!

Report on Peace

Report on Land

Decree on Abolishment of Capital Punishment

Decree on Transfer of Power to the Soviets

Decree on Establishment of the Workers' and Peasants' Government

Decree on Elections for the Constituent Assembly

Decree on Suppression of Hostile Newspapers

Decree on Transfer of Food Control to Municipalities

Decree on an Eight-Hour Working Day

Decree on the Right to Issue Laws

Resolution on the Right of Sovnarkom to Issue Decrees

Decree on Social Insurance

Declaration of the Rights of the People of Russia

Decree on Organization of Volost Land Committees

Decree on Transfer of Power and the Means of Production to the Toilers

Decree Proclaiming Advertising a State Monopoly

Decree Abolishing Classes and Civil Ranks

Decree on Workers' Control

Resolution on Relation of the Central Executive Committee to the Sovnarkom

Decree on the Right to Call for Re-Elections

Decree on Establishment of the Extraordinary Commission to Fight Counter-Revolution

V. I. Lenin Note To F. E. Dzerzhinsky with a Draft of A Decree On Fighting Counter-Revolutionaries And Saboteurs

H. G. Wells:

The Dreamer in the Kremlin