Nadezhda Konstantinovna "Nadya" Krupskaya was a Bolshevik revolutionary, a politician, the wife of Lenin, and (according to Trotsky's epitaph) "one of the most tragic figures in revolutionary history." She was born to an impoverished family of once-noble lineage. Even from a young age, she developed an interest in democratic education, and focussed her revolutionary energies on working for the youth, the workers and women.
She was arrested with Lenin and other Marxists, and married Lenin as a condition of joining him in Siberian exile.
She played a major role in the insurrection leading to the successful October Revolution, and afterwards devoted herself to education and cultural life, carrying out missions for the Red Army and teaching literacy to women.
After Lenin's death, she became increasingly isolated from and hidden by the Stalinist regime. She eventually rejoined the Party under Stalin, albeit in a much reduced role and with positions which seemed at odds with her life's work, in particular in supporting Stalin's restrictions of womnen's rights.
Nadya died in 1939.