Section - i: List of Illustrations Section - ii: Maps Section - iii: Notes on Dates and Spelling Unit - Part One: HOLY PILGRIM 1869-1904 Chapter - 1: Origins Chapter - 2: The Pilgrim Chapter - 3: Nicholas and Alexandra Chapter - 4: Monsieur Philippe Chapter - 5: Alexei Chapter - 6: The Burning Torch Chapter - 7: The Mad Monk Unit - Part Two: OUR FRIEND: 1905–1909 Chapter - 8: To the Throne Chapter - 9: Rasputin-Novy Chapter - 10: Sects and Whips Chapter - 11: Demons of the Silver Age Chapter - 12: Anna Vyrubova Chapter - 13: The Eyes Chapter - 14: “. . . prayers that purify and protect us.” Chapter - 15: The Investigation: Part I Chapter - 16: The First Test Chapter - 17: “better ten Rasputins . . .” Unit - Part Three: SCANDALS: 1910–1911 Chapter - 18: Trouble in the Nursery Chapter - 19: The Press Discovers Rasputin Chapter - 20: In Search of Rasputin Chapter - 21: Prince Yusupov Chapter - 22: Holy Land Chapter - 23: Rasputin in His Own Words Chapter - 24: Iliodor’s Triumph Chapter - 25: Two Murders Chapter - 26: Confronting the “Antichrist” Unit - Part Four: A TIME OF MIRACLES: 1912–July 1914 Chapter - 27: Germogen’s Fall Chapter - 28: Iliodor, Apostate Chapter - 29: Quousque tandem abutere patientia nostra? Chapter - 30: The Blow to the Alcove Chapter - 31: The Investigation II: Was Rasputin a Khlyst? Chapter - 32: The Miracle at Spala Chapter - 33: War and Celebration Chapter - 34: Gutter Talk, Name-Glorifiers, and Murder Plots Chapter - 35: On the Edge of a Precipice Chapter - 36: The Attack Chapter - 37: “This time it didn’t work . . .” Chapter - 38: Iliodor’s Flight Unit - Part Five: WAR: July 1914–1915 Chapter - 39: A Menacing Cloud Chapter - 40: The Incident at the Yar Chapter - 41: Rasputin’s Women Chapter - 42: Dinner with Rasputin Chapter - 43: The Religious Faces of Rasputin Chapter - 44: A Summer of Troubles Chapter - 45: The Tovarpar Chapter - 46: Nicholas Takes Command Chapter - 47: Rasputin, Favorite Chapter - 48: Fresh Scandal Chapter - 49: The Troika Chapter - 50: Gorokhovaya, 64 Chapter - 51: Dark Forces and Mad Chauffeurs Chapter - 52: Another Miracle Unit - Part Six: THE FINAL YEAR: 1916 Chapter - 53: Revolution in the Air Chapter - 54: The Minister Plots Murder Chapter - 55: Iliodor in America Chapter - 56: With Us or With Them Chapter - 57: Rasputin the Spy? Chapter - 58: Rasputin and the Jews Chapter - 59: “The sun will shine . . .” Chapter - 60: Apotheosis Chapter - 61: Stupidity or Treason Chapter - 62: “Vanya has arrived.” Chapter - 63: “My hour will soon strike” Chapter - 64: The Last Day Chapter - 65: A Cowardly Crime Chapter - 66: The Investigation Chapter - 67: The Body in the Water Chapter - 68: The Romanov Family Drama Chapter - 69: Orgies, Gay Love, and the Secret Hand of the British Chapter - 70: The End of the Tobolsk Yoke Unit - Part Seven: THE AFTERMATH: 1917-1918 Chapter - 71: A Time for Dominoes Chapter - 72: Here Lies the Dog Chapter - 73: The Myth Chapter - 74: Unsettled Business Section - iv: Epilogue Acknowledgements - v: Acknowledgements Section - vi: Bibliography Section - vii: Endnotes Index - viii: Index
Acclaimed historian Douglas Smith's riveting - and revisionist - biography of Rasputin
Douglas Smith is an internationally recognized expert in Russian history and the critically acclaimed and award-winning author of numerous articles and three books, including, most recently, Former People (also published by Pan Macmillan).Before becoming a historian, Douglas Smith worked with the U.S. State Department in the Soviet Union and as a Russian affairs analyst for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Munich.
Douglas Smith has delivered the definitive biography that is
brilliantly gripping, as hypnotic, wild and erotic in its
revelations as the Mad Monk himself, sensitive in its human
portrait, astute in its political analysis, superbly researched
with rich new material gathered in faraway archives, and populated
with the zaniest cast of the deranged Romanovs, depraved bishops,
whores, mountebanks, adventuresses, mystics and murderers.
*Simon Sebag Montefiore*
The most comprehensive account of Rasputin to date, brimming with
complexities and fascinating detail, and stands as an enlightening
re-evaluation of this crucial figure in Russian history.
*Daily Telegraph*
Douglas Smith begins this impressive biography by rubbishing almost
everything previously written, stripping away a century of myth,
fabrication, gossip and lies . . . a fascinating, often
entertaining, biography.
*The Times*
Utterly fascinating and foreniscally detailed . . .There are plenty
of Rasputin biographies already, but its superlative scholarship
and attention to detail put this one in a class of its own.
*Sunday Times*
This brilliantly written, meticulously researched account of the
life of Rasputin is the best, most complete and accurate I have
ever read. Step by step, day by day, week by week in this life,
Douglas Smith tells the story from its humble beginnings, through
its obscene sexual chapters, to its violent end. He describes how a
peasant became 'Our Friend' to the last emperor and empress of
Russia. He explains why this dependency came at terrible cost for
the imperial couple, for their children, for Russia, and for the
Twentieth Century world. Readers will begin by saying that this is
an impossible story to believe. They will read on because, in
Douglas Smith's mesmerizing telling, it must be believed. And
because it did happen.
*Robert K. Massie, author of Nicholas and Alexandra*
Some years ago when working on a historical novel I had to read all
the existing Rasputin biographies, and they do abound - in all
literary styles and in many languages. What a pity that Douglas
Smith's Rasputin had not yet been published, it would have saved me
a lot of time. If you are interested in the story of the Romanovs'
pet prophet this is the book to read.
*Boris Akunin*
A prodigious piece of scholarship. Doug Smith's exhaustive and
forensic examination of a wealth of new and previously unseen
evidence finally lays to rest the tired old myth of 'the mad monk'
and rightly positions Rasputin as a crucial figure in late Imperial
Russian history.
*Helen Rappaport, author of Four Sisters*
Douglas Smith understands that history is not only what happened,
but what people think happened. In Rasputin, he deftly unpicks
myth, legend and fact, separating and examining each thread, before
weaving them back to create a pattern not merely of a man, but of a
time, and a place, and a revolution. It is, itself,
revolutionary.
*Judith Flanders, author of A Circle of Sisters*
Few figures in 20th century history have been more obscured by myth
and legend than Grigory Yefimovich Rasputin, the mystic confident
of the last tsar and tsarina. In his research, comprehensive to the
nth degree, Douglas Smith has dug up previously unseen archives,
followed previously unexplored leads, and connected the dots across
the Russian landscape. They're dots of blood. Rasputin reveals the
true character of the man without minimizing his malign hold on the
loathsome, feckless Romanovs.
*Ken Kalfus, author of The Commissariat of
Enlightenment*
The very best biographies illuminate an individual and the time and
place in which they lived. In this magisterial,
exhaustively-researched work on Rasputin, Douglas Smith paints a
rich, detailed portrait of one of history's most fascinating
individuals while also chronicling the dramatic last days of the
Tsar. It's a wondrous read.
*Neal Bascomb, author of The Winter Fortress*
It is hard to imagine a historical figure more barnacled with myth
than Rasputin. Douglas Smith unravels Rasputin's complex narrative
in unprecedented detail, showing how he was a kind of chimera onto
which could be hung all the ills of a disintegrating Russia. In the
process Smith vividly exposes the astonishing blindness of the
ruling class that made its tragic end inevitable. A brilliant
achievement.
*Rosemary Sullivan, author of Stalin’s Daughter*
The most complete and masterful study of Rasputin that I've read.
Douglas Smith's work is not only extraordinarily readable, but rich
in detail.
*Robert Alexander, New York Times bestselling author of
The Kitchen Boy*
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