Marie Antoinette: The Journey Antonia Frasier 2001 |
True or false? 1) Marie Antoinette was a frivolous princess who became a clever, manipulative queen 2) She ruled France through her weak husband 3) She said of the bread-less French, "Let them eat cake." 4) In her spare time, she enjoyed dressing as a milk maid and wandering around a fake farm she had built at Versailles. If you answered "true" to any of these questions, you will want to read Antonia Fraser's detailed, engrossing biography of Marie Antoinette. Fraser's work is well-documented and scholarly, but it is neither dry nor slow reading. She provides sufficient background information to put the historical events in context, but does not allow the facts to hinder the flow of the story. Her writing has an immediacy that pulls the reader so deeply into the story, it is easy to forget that we already know the ending of this historical life. (When the royal family attempts to escape their French captors, Fraser allows us to think-to hope-they might get away.) Through Fraser's eyes, we first sympathize, and then empathize with the princess who only became queen by accident. In addition, Frazer gives us a thorough education in the social order at Versailles, the complex bureaucracy (and attendant jobs) of the French court, and the political infighting that ultimately was the downfall of the entire system. This is a thoroughly engrossing biography-a keeper. Reviewed by Matthew Spady |
Suite Francaise Irene Nemirousky 2006 |
Irène Némirovsky, a successful Russian born novelist, was living in Paris at the start of the second world war - 1939. Although of Jewish parentage, she was in fact a Catholic, married and with two small children. By 1940 it was clear that France would be overthrown and Paris would be occupied by the Nazis. The Parisienne, and particularly the Jewish citizens of Paris, on hearing the guns of war outside their city, then proceeded by the thousands, to flee, and make for the rural communities of France hoping to avoid the wrath of the Nazis. In the case of the Jews, it was in order to save their lives. Némirovsky and her family fled to a small town in central France and she began to write the first of what she planned to be a series of four or five stories about the French experience during the war. She had completed her drafts of the first two of these, when she was discovered by the German SS and sent immediately to a concentration camp. Within a month, at the age of 39, she was executed. After a relatively short time her husband suffered the same fate. The children were taken by a friend and hidden from the Nazis for the duration of the war, and survived. They took their Mother's manuscript into hiding with them and some 60 years later, it was taken by Némirovsky's daughter, Denise Epstein to a publisher. Reviewed by Dennis Frampton |
Hiding in Plain Sight Betty Lauer 2004 |
Hiding In Plain Sight: The Incredible True Story Of A German-Jewish Teenager's Struggle To Survive In Nazi-Occupied Poland is the story of Bertle Weissberger, a twelve-year-old Jewish girl who lived with her mother Ilona and sister Eva in Hindenburg, Germany when on October 28th, 1938 the Nazis began rounding up all the Jews in Hindenburg and forcibly expelled Bertel and her family into Poland. There for the next seven years Bertel learned to speak Polish, changed her appearance, used falsified documents, and lived as a young Polish woman under an assumed name in her struggle to survive Nazi holocaust. Hiding In Plain Sight is a testament to the enduring human spirit and a welcome, highly recommended addition to the growing library of Holocaust Studies and eye-witness biographies. Reviewed by Midwest Book Review |
Catherine the Great:
Portrait of a Woman Robert Massie 2011 |
Massie has taken the well know story of Catherine and written a highly readable Russian history. Catherine, whose baptismal name was Sophie was a teenager when she was brought to Russia by Empress Elizabeth to become the wife of Grand Duke Peter, heir to the Russian throne. When Sophie arrived she was unable to speak Russian, knew nothing of the customs and was directed to convert to the Orthodox religion from her German Lutheranism. She took the Russian name Katerina. Catherine's marriage was deeply unhappy and the union remained unconsummated for 10 years. During that time she educated herself in all things Russian and worked to give herself a classical education corresponding with Voltaire, Grimm and Diderot. Catherine did produce a son but no one thought that Peter was the father. Evidently this was an unimportant detail in 18th century Russia. Her son Paul was recognized as a member of the royal family and in line for the throne. When Peter finally came to throne his reign was short and dysfunctional. In a coup he was removed from the throne and Catherine declared Empress. In 1762 she began her 35 year rule of Russia. She reigned with compassion and intelligence. She worked to improve medicine in Russia, becoming the first to be inoculated against smallpox and ensuring the vaccine was available in Russia. She amassed a collection of European art that even today is unrivaled. She instituted a legal code and extended the boundaries of the empire to borders that stood until 1991. She built schools and orphanages and developed curricula that provided for a broad education for those lucky enough to get schooling. Catherine's personal life was also fascinating. Massie identifies over 10 men who were her lovers. She was passionate in all aspects of her personal life. In addition to ensuring her lovers had a pretty face she looked for intellectual stimulation. She was serially monogamous. Her most serious and long standing relationship was with Gregory Potemkin. Massie postulates but doesn't prove that Catherine and Potemkin were married. They remained lifelong friends and allies. She enabled him to essentially rule southern Russia, developing the city of Odessa to give Russia a port on the Black Sea. Strongly recommended for those who love history! Reviewed by Phillygal |
The Sisters: The Saga of the MItford Family Mary Lovell 2003 |
"The Sisters: The Saga of the Mitford Family" tells the (true) story of the Mitford sisters, six beautiful and talented aristocratic young women who came of age in the interwar period.(There was a brother Tom who died during WWII. He does not play a major role in this book nor does it seem in their lives.) These women lived, for the most part, amazing (though not admirable in all cases) lives: Nancy, the oldest, became a best selling novelist; Pamela, the"least interesting" (to the biographer and her family, though not necessarily the reader), lived a country life after a marriage to a brilliant man who married compulsively (six total); Diana, the society beauty, who left her husband for the fascist Oswald Mosley and who befriended Hitler; Unity, whobecame obsessed with Hitler and met him 140 times during a short period before WWII; Jessica, the rebel, who eloped at 18, became a communist, moved to the states, and became a best selling author on such topics as the funeral home industry; and Deborah, the youngest, who made the most brilliant marriage, to the future Duke of Devonshire. This book details the eccentric but loving childhood of these sisters (though the father had murderous rages that seemed to have a lifelong impact on the children) and the diverse set of political causes and men that both brought them together and drove them apart over the years. Any book that affords the reader glimpses of Churchill as an uncle, Hitler as a "friend", Maya Angelou as an honorary "sister", is worth its price. Lovell presents her material in a straightforward manner. The book is thoroughly researched. It is a great read particularly for those fascinated by the British upper classes between the two wars. Reviewed by crazyforgems |
Testament of Youth Vera Britain 2005 (reissued) |
The word "classic" gets thrown around a lot these days. Many so-called "modern classics" are not that important, but "Testament of Youth" deserves this reprint as a Penguin Classic. Brittain tells of her early life in the north of England between 1893 and the start of World War I in 1914 in beautifully clear prose, and her clarity of thought and powers of observation make the bulk of the book, dealing with the war's impact on her, painfully vivid without ever lapsing into self-pity. Like too many others of her generation (and the next and the next) Vera Brittain learned almost unimaginable lessons about life and her own inner strength. To that extent, "Testament of Youth" can serve as both example and inspiration.
Vera Brittain came from an upper-middle-class background shared by millions of young women in late Victorian England. One thing that made her different was her great intellectual curiosity and determination to escape a truly suffocating existence that few of today's Western women can easily imagine. What made her like most citizens of the time and of later times)was her complete ignorance of the meaning of "war." Patriotism, her social conscience, and a desire to take part in the bigger world led her to volunteer as a nursing sister with the British Army. Her grueling hospital experiences were a revelation to her. Her personal losses are even more powerfully revealing of the human condition. Brittain was a "survivor" in every sense of the word. "Testament of Youth" is just as fresh and moving today as it was when it was written 75 years ago and Vera Brittain tells a story that must be told and retold to each generation. For every reader who finds the book "too long" by current standards (its almost 700 pages), there will be two who wish they could follow the author even further. But even if you find yourself skipping ahead, particularly in the early part, you will not be able to forget Vera Brittain or her story. "Testament of Youth" is one of the great autobiographies of the past 100 years. reviewed by Moose Squirrel |
Eleni Nicholas Gage 1983 |
Human diminishment is the theme of this masterwork, which shows how people can sacrifice their rational powers and nobler instincts on the altar of a reductionist ideology, then descend into the (home) economics of envy and the politics of resentment, and end up killing off even the mildest opposition. Concretely, it is about how Communist guerrillas in Epirus took over the village of Lia, reduced the once sturdy villagers to treacherous, starving, vermin-infested semi-savages, used them for slave labor, and finally murdered many of them. The story centers on Eleni Gatzoyiannis, who attempts to escape with her children, more for their sakes than her own. The Communists manage to get other villagers to snitch on her and they end up torturing and murdering her in a ravine along with a few other villagers. Nicholas Gage reports here on what he found out about exactly what happened in that doomed village and what happened to Eleni. Gage is, in fact, Eleni's only son and he managed to escape to America just before the Greek national armies managed to rid the northern mountains of the Communists. A successful journalist in the US, he has written a marvelous account of some unsettling and depressing events. Toward the end of the book he has the chance to take revenge on the person most responsible for his mother's fate, but decides it would be a more fitting tribute to her if he did without his revenge. Some parts of the narrative are (necessarily) reconstructed, but in general the work is faithful to the facts of history. Extremely powerful, it will stay with the reader long after the reading is finished.
Reviewed by Alekos |
This is an incredible book, beautifully written and researched. It is also heartbreaking. I can’t tell you how many times I read something about one of the four Romanov sisters, the doomed daughters of Czar Nicholas and Alexandra, that caused me to stop reading and just stare at the faces on the cover. The author brings these young women to life, and it is impossible not to grieve for the innocent, young lives lost too soon.
Although the title refers to the four sisters (who referred to themselves as OTMA – Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia), the book actually begins before the marriage of their parents. Nicholas and Alexandra came to love each other very much; they were absolutely perfect for each other. They were absolutely wrong for the Russian monarchy. Nicholas would have made a wonderful country gentleman. Alexandra was very shy and suffered from health problems that limited her mobility. They were, however, warm and loving persons. How happy they could have been in other circumstances.
From Alexandra, Russia expects two things – for her to give birth to a son, and for her to be a social leader. Instead, she is almost invisible except for the disappointing announcements, one after another after another, of the birth of her daughters. And then, while the rest of the world is fascinated by the four Grand Duchesses, in Russia they are viewed as irrelevant and unimportant.
The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of
the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
Helen Rappaport
2014
The girls live in virtual isolation. The only freedom they have is when they travel, especially on their yacht. They are constantly under threat, and they are constantly surrounded by armed guards. Still, they are brought up to be loving and charitable persons. Their personalities do come across. Anastasia is often a brat. Tatiana and Maria are stalwart. Olga, the oldest, is the most deeply affected by their confinement. She should have long been married and away, but instead she is kept at home. I just wanted to scream how unfair it all was. When they traveled outside of Russia, I wanted someone to stop them from going back. I wanted someone to rescue them, to protect them, to take care of them.
Reviewed by JLee
Although the title refers to the four sisters (who referred to themselves as OTMA – Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia), the book actually begins before the marriage of their parents. Nicholas and Alexandra came to love each other very much; they were absolutely perfect for each other. They were absolutely wrong for the Russian monarchy. Nicholas would have made a wonderful country gentleman. Alexandra was very shy and suffered from health problems that limited her mobility. They were, however, warm and loving persons. How happy they could have been in other circumstances.
From Alexandra, Russia expects two things – for her to give birth to a son, and for her to be a social leader. Instead, she is almost invisible except for the disappointing announcements, one after another after another, of the birth of her daughters. And then, while the rest of the world is fascinated by the four Grand Duchesses, in Russia they are viewed as irrelevant and unimportant.
The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of
the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
Helen Rappaport
2014
The girls live in virtual isolation. The only freedom they have is when they travel, especially on their yacht. They are constantly under threat, and they are constantly surrounded by armed guards. Still, they are brought up to be loving and charitable persons. Their personalities do come across. Anastasia is often a brat. Tatiana and Maria are stalwart. Olga, the oldest, is the most deeply affected by their confinement. She should have long been married and away, but instead she is kept at home. I just wanted to scream how unfair it all was. When they traveled outside of Russia, I wanted someone to stop them from going back. I wanted someone to rescue them, to protect them, to take care of them.
Reviewed by JLee
Spy Mistress
William Stevenson 2022 |
This book was filled with fascinating information about the British SOE, The other British secret agencies, the role of Jews in WW II, the OSS and its relationship with the Brits and the French and Polish Intelligence agencies. Therein lies the problem; there was enough for half a dozen books and the book did not do justice to any single one of these interesting subjects. Nor did it flesh out the suject of the book in enough detail.
Reviewed by AJRSDR |
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Isabella: The Warrior Queen
Kristen Downey 2014 |
"Isabella: The Warrior Queen", by Kirstin Downey is not only an
excellent bio of Queen Isabella, but is a splendid overview of European
and Ottoman history in the second half of the 15th century. Isabella
of Castile has not been well-received in writings of history. Seen as
the "other half" of Ferdinand of Aragon, she has has been blamed for the
Inquisition in Spain, the mass deportation of the country's Jewish
population, and the problems of exploration and colonization of the "New
World".
Downey takes the effort to view each of these topics in the context of the time and how Isabella reacted to world events. For instance, two years after Isabella's birth in 1451, the Ottoman Turks finally captured the city of Constantinople. They soon began to take Christian lands in what is now eastern Europe. They threatened the entire Mediterranean area and were alleged to have done unspeakable horrors to Christians in the conquered areas. Isabella grew up with this threat and as a fervent Catholic, her most important task as queen was to make sure the Muslims in the small part of Spain they already controlled, did not extend further into her lands. She and Ferdinand - King of Aragon - embarked on the military battles to drive the Muslims completely from the Iberian peninsula. Their success - called the "Reconquista" - brought Christianity to the former southern part of the country. Isabella rode into battles along with her troops. But driving the Muslims from Spain did not bring religious unity to her lands. She and Ferdinand began the Inquisition in an attempt to purify religious worship in Spain. They first went after those Jews who had converted to Christianity, called "conversos". Worried that these "new Christians" were back-sliding into their former faith, religious courts were convened to find these secret Jews. It was a few years later, when Isabella realised that the Jews still practicing their religion were probably influencing those "conversos" she was so concerned with, that she ordered the expulsion of the Jews from Spain. Their forced departure seemed to coincide with the departure of Christopher Columbus and his three small ships westward in October, 1492. She had teased Columbus for years about sponsoring his explorations and finally gave permission and funding in early 1492. Kirstin Downey also does an excellent job at examining Isabella's influence on the future of Europe. The mother of five children - four daughters and one son - she raised her children as well-educated future leaders. Marrying off the daughters in advantageous unions; her grandchildren ruled from Portugal eastward to Bohemia, from Spain northward to England and Burgandy. Isabella's practice of her Catholic faith was a personal one. She felt that all her subjects should practice that faith with the same fervency she did. Was that an excuse for her actions in the Inquisition and the expulsion of the Jews from Spain? No, but it is an explanation of those actions. Kirstin Downey's book is absolutely first rate. For the arm chair historian like me, it gave a well-written look into the world of 600 years ago. Reviewed by Jill Meyer |
40 Autumns
Nina Willner 2016 |
You can’t get much more authentic than a memoir written by the daughter of a Holocaust survivor and a mother who escaped communist East Germany just before the Berlin Wall shut off East Berlin. This is Nina Willner’s amazing and brilliantly written “Forty Autumns: A Family’s Story of Courage and Survival on Both Sides of the Iron Curtain”. Willner’s narrative begins with a Preface in which she recalls herself as a kindergartner, being upset because she had no one to “show off” at Grandparents’ Day. That’s when she was told her maternal grandparents lived “behind the curtain” – what she later learned was the Iron Curtain – and could only rarely be contacted, and that with great circumspection. From that point, an intricate development of the heartrending story evolves: how her grandmother, “Oma” saw the end of WWII in their home in Schwaneberg, which was first liberated by American troops, then turned over to Russia following the Warsaw Pact. Fearing the assault which was rumored to be perpetrated by the Russians, Oma tried to send her eldest daughter Hanna, Nina’s mother, with the Americans as they withdrew, but Hanna panicked and slipped away, returning home, only to realize eventually that she could not endure the oppression of the new communist dictatorship. After two failed (and harrowing) attempts, Hanna finally managed to escape to West Germany, where she eventually met and married Eddie, Nina’s army-officer father. Although keeping in touch was extremely difficult due to the censorship and travel restrictions imposed by the East German regime – which grew ever more repressive during the Cold War era -- the “family connection” was never totally broken, and after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, this amazing family was indeed reunited, although by that time Hanna’s parents and three of her brothers had passed away. In addition to the wonderful narrative, Willner thoughtfully provides a family tree, and an exhaustive chronology of major events in her family paralleling world events that occurred at those times. She also gives a somewhat more detailed summary of “Historical Notes After the Fall” in which she discusses what became of various groups following the liberation of East Germany. From a personal perspective, I found this story not only extremely enlightening but also wonderfully hopeful. Given all the political and material vicissitudes this amazing family experienced, their continued family solidarity and – as the subtitle indicates – courage and survival – is awesomely inspirational. Reviewed by Trudie Barreras |
