Contributor(s): Professor Timothy Snyder | Marx and Engels tended to be romantics about East European liberation from imperial rule in the nineteenth century, but the period of nominally Marxist rule in the twentieth is one of oppression. The theorists imagined a revolution that would spread from Germany to the East, yet history brought a revolution that arose in Russia and then spread to the West. What can we say, today, about the theory and the practice? Was Marxism in any sense native to Eastern Europe? Timothy Snyder will discuss. Professor Timothy Snyder is Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs at LSE IDEAS for 2013-2014.