Reviews for Dnevnik Aleksei︠a︡ Sergeevicha Suvorina

The average rating for Dnevnik Aleksei︠a︡ Sergeevicha Suvorina based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2014-07-03 00:00:00 John LeMaster I think Lytton Strachey must have been reincarnated as Edvard Radzinsky. It's the same style of biography; deliciously written, immediate, the facts of the subject's life synthesized and distilled into a highly engaging account, but also with its flaws of lacking rigor and relying too much on such imagined details as the quality of someone's stare or their thoughts, with a fair amount of conjecture in addition. Strachey was a groundbreaker. I have no sense of Radzinsky's place in Russian historiography, so perhaps he also invented the lightbulb, but this modern reader expects citations. A great read and as I didn't know much beyond the bare bones of 19th century Russian history quite informative.

Review # 2 was written on 2018-08-12 00:00:00 Anthony Bolden This fascinating biography covers a lot of ground, explaining the forces that shaped the character and fate of the liberator tsar whom Radzinsky often compares with Mikhael Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union. This biography, which also includes a detailed history of mid-19th century Russia, covers the Romanov family starting with Peter the Great, the tsar's personal life, problems with political reform, the golden age of Russian literature, the populist Narodnik movement, the roots and influences of the late 19th century terrorist group, People's Will and profiles the many contemporaries who were close to the tsar or significant historical figures at the time. Although Razinsky takes on a serious topics and covers a lot of detail gleaned from many sources, his writing is not dry at all. Alexander's tutor, the poet Vasily Zhukovsky, sums up the problems of political reform and dealing with change. "Revolution is a fatal effort to leap from Monday right into Wednesday. But the effort to leap from Monday back to Sunday is just as fatal."