# John Reed — Ten Days That Shook the World character guide

> John Reed in Ten Days That Shook the World by John Reed.

**Role:** major

**Also known as:** John Reed

**First appearance:** 0010-ten-days-that-shook-the-world

## Snapshot

An American journalist with a notebook and a front-row seat, he turns Petrograd's street clashes and smoky committee rooms into the most intimate eyewitness account of 1917.

## Who they are

Reed moves through Smolny, the barracks, and the barricades as a foreign correspondent who is also a committed sympathizer, recording arguments, slogans, and the smell of unwashed crowds. His tension is double: he wants to be inside the revolution's confidence while still claiming the reporter's detached eye, and he keeps testing whether the Bolsheviks can truly speak for Russia's peasant millions. That question—whether a workers' rising can hold a country that is eighty percent peasant—drives the book's middle chapters and gives his reporting its anxious edge.

## In the story

### [Sources](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/sources)

Author and narrator, compiler of the sources listed.

### [Ten Days That Shook the World](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/ten-days-that-shook-the-world)

Narrator and eyewitness to the events.

### [Background](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/i-background)

Narrator and observer; recounts conversations and events in Petrograd.

### [II: The Coming Storm](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/ii-the-coming-storm)

Narrator and observer present at the all-night meeting of the Petrograd Soviet and other events.

### [IV: The Fall of the Provisional Government](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/iv-the-fall-of-the-provisional-government)

Narrator and participant, distributing the proclamation and observing events.

### [Counterrevolution](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/viii-counterrevolution)

Narrator and observer, moving between Smolny, the Duma, and the secret headquarters of the Committee for Salvation.

### [IX: Victory](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/ix-victory)

Narrator; visits the Battalion Committee of the Sixth Reserve Engineers' Battalion and later returns to Smolny, observing the aftermath of the fighting.

### [Moscow](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/x-moscow)

Narrator and observer; travels to Moscow to assess the true feeling of the Russian people about the Revolution.

### [Wages and Cost of Living Before and During the Revolution](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/2-wages-and-cost-of-living-before-and-during-the-revolution)

Author and narrator, arriving in Petrograd in September 1917 and reporting on wage and cost data.

### [Interview with Kerensky](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/13-interview-with-kerensky)

Narrates the interview with Kerensky and notes the subsequent censorship by Kerensky's secretary.

### [Events of the Night, November 6th](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/7-events-of-the-night-november-6th)

Narrator and observer of the night's events.

### [3: Looting of the Winter Palace](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/3-looting-of-the-winter-palace)

Author and narrator; provides firsthand testimony about the looting and the subsequent recovery efforts.

### [Damage to the Kremlin](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/1-damage-to-the-kremlin)

Narrator who personally inspected the Kremlin damage after the bombardment.

### [Questionnaire for the Bourgeoisie](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/3-questionnaire-for-the-bourgeoisie)

Narrator and observer of the Bolshevik questionnaire process.

### [Endnotes](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/chapters/endnotes)

Referenced as author of 'Kornilov to Brest-Litovsk'.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/characters/john_reed
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/ten_days_that_shook_the_world_se/characters