Donald Rayfield
Making of an Empress
Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman
By Robert K Massie
Head of Zeus 625pp £25
Catherine the Great reckoned that over her lifetime she had just twelve lovers. If that was the case, her lovers have been outnumbered by her biographers, who often resemble the former in their infatuation or calculating exploitation, their brilliance or their inept fumblings. Robert K Massie, acclaimed for his biographies of Tsar Nicolas II and his consort, and of Peter the Great, is certainly both enamoured and brilliant – the advocate that anyone accused of heinous crimes, as Catherine the Great has been, would want on the Day of Judgement. He also writes as well as any living novelist.
However, Massie’s book has flaws. First and foremost, he does not read Russian: when he wrote his earlier biographies he was married to Suzanne, who taught President Reagan to say in Russian ‘Trust, but verify’, and who gave her husband the expertise that this book lacks. Admittedly most private and
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
‘In matters of the heart, cats are at the heart of the matter.’
So says @OSoden on the explosion of cat mania in the early twentieth century.
Oliver Soden - Pussies Galore
Oliver Soden: Pussies Galore - Catland: Feline Enchantment and the Making of the Modern World by Kathryn Hughes
literaryreview.co.uk
A recent inquiry found that British security services had effectively licensed the IRA assassin known as Stakeknife to commit multiple murders.
@malodoherty picks apart the murky world of spying and counterespionage in Northern Ireland.
Malachi O’Doherty - Belfast Confidential
Malachi O’Doherty: Belfast Confidential - Four Shots in the Night: A True Story of Espionage, Murder and Justice ...
literaryreview.co.uk
‘Creative non-fiction, I am so sick of this bullshit’, says Michael Anderson, an editor of the New York Times Book Review.
@rosalyster returns to its genesis.
Rosa Lyster - Two Sides to the Story
Rosa Lyster: Two Sides to the Story - The Fine Art of Literary Fist-Fighting: How a Bunch of Rabble Rousers, O...
literaryreview.co.uk