Wealth Gap Becomes Abyss

The Family Romanov: Murder, Rebellion & the Fall of Imperial Russia by Candace Fleming
New York : Schwartz & Wade Books, [2014]
292 p. : ill., geneal. table, map ; 25 cm.

With the current trend of the rapidly widening gaps between the very rich and everyone else in the US and globally, the sad tale of the Romanov family ought to serve as a cautionary tale.  But how to convey the complexity of the last Russian Tsar - a timid man who desperately did not want to be the ruler of Russia, but also a dictator who gleefully launched waves of repression against dissidents and Jews which killed thousands?  And how to do it for a high school audience?  In The Family Romanov, Candace Fleming has done a remarkable job on meeting the challenge.

Her book is an extremely well researched book, but reads a lot like a novel.  She also balances the "Dowton Abbey" gawking at the obscene opulence of the Russian elite with alternating sections that powerfully describe the horrible poverty and oppression of the Russian peasantry and workers.  

from the LOC (also on the books cover)

I love reading about Russian history and about this period just before and during WWI, and this book is a great addition to that list.  Fleming does a wonderful job of including enough illustrations and of explaining the basics of the Russian Revolution (no easy task).  She also manages to flesh out each of the members of the Tsarist family and conveying the both the historical and human sides of the story of their downfall and eventual murders.

This would be a great book to recommend to any student who is curious about the Russian Revolution, but doesn't want a dry history of the events.  It answers a lot of the basic questions, but also stokes the curiosity of any historically minded person who will definitely want to read more.

Sprawling History, Sprawling Novel

The Kremlin, Moscow, Russia

Dr. Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
New York : Vintage Classics, 2011.
xxviii, 675 p. ; 21 cm.

I've been wanting to read Dr. Zhivago for some time, and given it's length  (675 p.), it seemed like a good choice for a summer read.

I enjoyed a lot about this novel - it richly conveys the crazy reality that war and revolution can force on people, and the ways in which people try to find a meaningful life within that.  It is also a great love story, of course, which is probably part of why the movie version in the 60s was so successful.

I liked the historical content and movement of a lot of the book, but I did find that the plot began to get a bit unwieldy and confusing as the novel went on, and felt rushed to me at the end.  I also just found the increasing number of improbable coincidences became distracting as read the book.

This was a good book, but not a fantastic novel, in the way that Dostoevsky and Tolstoy have their truly magnificent articles.  However, if a student is a fan of Russian/Soviet history and literature and is looking for a good read, Dr. Zhivago may be just what the doctor ordered!

Velvet Gloves and Iron Fists

From the Wikipedia article on the 1848 revolutions

1848: Year of Revolution by Mike Rapport
New York : Basic Books, 2010, c2008.
xii, 461 p. : ill., map ; 24 cm.

You might remember that a while back I wanted to read Barbara Tuchman's Proud Tower, but realized that my background knowledge of 18th and 19th century Europe was sorely lacking - and so read a slim little volume about the Napoleonic Wars - and then was going to read 1848. Well, I've read it, and what an intense and complicated time 1848-1850 was!  Revolutions in Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Venice, Rome, Buda and Pest, Naples, and Florence (among others) pitted liberals, reactionaries, nationalists, imperialists, Papists, monarchists, socialists, revolutionaries, the peasantry, and the nobility in violent conflicts to determine the future of regions, kingdoms, and  Europe as a whole.  By the time 1850 rolled around, the forces of authoritarianism, conservatism and reaction sadly had triumphed - but what an incredible time it was...

In spite of the extreme complexities involved (maps would have been an invaluable addition to this book), Rapport writes well and is able to convey many of the significant underlying themes, conflicts, causes and effects of the year 1848.  His book really is relevant, since much of what stoked the conflicts still exists - extreme wealth and extreme poverty, ethnic versus nationalist tensions, majority rule versus minority protections, and individual rights versus the common good.

I can't say I'd recommend this book to just any student, but if there were a student who loved history and was interested in European history, then this is definitely an excellent read!