A thorough history of the Romanov family from the 1860s to the
1960s that provides rich detail about individual members and a
general assessment of the family at large. There are numerous books
on individual members of the Romanov family, but Tufts historian
Perry (Beneath the Eagle's Wings: Americans in Occupied Japan,
1980) and Russian scholar Pleshakov claim to be the first to look
at the family as a whole in the turbulent decades before and after
the 1917 revolution. At the heart of the Romanov family was the
tsar, and this account fleshes out the figures of the final three
tsars: Alexander II, Alexander III, and Nicholas II. With a flair
for dramatic narrative, the authors portray the intimate and
official sides of these three unlike men. Yet, they rightly
recognize that "the tsar's charisma extended to the whole family."
Throughout their book, Perry and Pleshakov pay equal attention to
the grand dukes and duchesses and their families. By striking this
balance, they provide a convincing account of a family all of whose
lives were regimented and formal and whose dissimilar personalities
fit into these confines in different ways. Above all, they are
sensitive to the frustrations of being a member of the Romanov
family other than the tsar himself. The numerous grand dukes had
responsibility without authority. The women they married, most
often members of European royalty, had to find their way within the
Romanov world and vie for influence with their husbands and
relations. While sympathetic to the hardships of Romanov family
life, Perry and Pleshakov lay serious blame on the members for the
failure of leadership that "brought a tragedy of monumental
proportions to the people of Russia." A family tree would have
greatly benefited readers. A balanced account of the Romanovs that
explores the full breadth of the family's life and personalities.
(Kirkus Reviews)
This history of the last years of Russia's imperial family is a
saga of love and lust, personal tensions and rivalries, antagonisms
and hatreds. It describes the last century of the Russian imperial
dynasty - a century that saw some of the greatest social and
political upheavals in all of recorded history. Drawing upon a
wealth of untapped resources from Russian, British, and American
archives, including unpublished diaries of many of the principal
characters and never-before-published photographs, Perry and
Pleshakov render a portrait of a family and their time, from the
youth of Alexander III in the 1860s to the death, one hundred years
later, of his daughter Olga Alexandrovna, the last Grand Duchess.
Set against the backdrop of this most cataclysmic century, The
Flight of the Romanovs is for anyone interested in this fascinating
dynasty, Russian history, and the history of European royalty.
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