Day 181 – 52 Books in 52 Weeks

Helen Rappaport’s The Last Days of the Romanovs: Tragedy at Ekaterinburg (a National Bestseller according to the cover) was supposed to be a historical narrative of the final fourteen days of the Tsar and his family. I found it neither a good story (as form is concerned) nor unbiased. Garbage.

My first tip-off that this wasn’t going to be a good book was the fact that it begins with four pages of acknowledgments, followed by page after page of overly sensational, dramatic sentences that all lack references and makes you wonder, “How did she know about this? From whom did she get this information?”

Rappaport, in the first five paragraphs, goes to great lengths to build her “historical” narrative. Here is just a few that really stuck out:
“overwhelmingly emotional pull”
“Suddenly gripped by alarm”
“parlayed over the telegraph”
“anxiety levels rocketed”
“full, ugly force of Russia in revolution”
“stony-faced Bolsheviks”
“a truck bristling with armed soldiers”
“emphatic instructions”

… and you want me to take this as a serious historical narrative?

I also found the book very biased. She would bring up the “fact” that investigators into the Romanov murders blame the Jews. In my rather limited reading on the subject, I’ve never once encountered this topic. Amazingly, she doesn’t offer any names.

I also found her descriptions of Tsar Nicholas II negative – thus promoting a bias in her story. “Malleable” and “incapable of making independent judgments” (page 51) are just a couple. She also calls his charm and modesty “superficial.” She even seems to condemn him because of his faith in God. She frowns upon him for living a simple life and liking outdoor activities (page 49). She even suggests that he had drugs infused in his cigarettes which helped him to be “indifferent” to losing the throne (page 55).

Now to get to the real problems. Not only did I find many of her “facts” contradictory to what Robert T. Massie recounts in his two books (considered the best books on the topic), but she even contradicted herself.

On page 15, she talks of Ipatiev being given 48 hours to vacate his house (this is where the Tsar and his family were to be imprisoned). However, according to Massie, it was only 24 hours. Not that big of a deal. However, she states that Ipatiev was on a vacation and had to hurry back to clear out his things. This is after she states that transportation was hindered because of the war. So if this guy is in Petrograd (St. Petersburg) about 1600 miles away, how is he able to get to Ekakerinburg so quickly when even the Tsar’s captors can’t travel that fast? This isn’t explained.

On page 22 she talks about the Imperial family having their diaries packed with their things but feared their discovery – this is after she talks about how their stuff was searched upon arrival and items (such as the camera) were taken away. So if the family was worried about the diaries (and possible political secrets being divulged) why didn’t they destroy them while still captive at the palace at Tsarskoe Selo? Again, contradictory and not explained or cited.

Page 27, the last paragraph of the chapter, “Whilst he might still be in denial about the true nature of his imprisonment and his ultimate fate, on the morning of 4 July, the former Tsar of Russia would begin, finally, to discover what captivity in the Urals really entailed.” Here again, she’s putting the Tsar in a negative light, making him appear as if he’s really so stupid as to think he’s going to get out of this revolution alive. Even in her introduction she quotes him as saying, “I would go anywhere at all, only not to the Urals.” He knew the people there blamed him for their poor condition, hence his desire not to go in that direction.

On page 29 she begins a wonderfully confusing tale about Lenin being worried about the Tsar’s supposed murder (this was prior to the actual murder). He was apparently so worried, in fact, he sent a commander from the Front in Perm 300 miles to check on the situation (again, nothing is cited). Yet throughout the book, she talks about Sverdlov (Lenin’s right-hand man), Goloshchekin (a friend of Sverdlov) and others keeping track of the situation. On page 105 she even says, “…control of the Imperial Family’s life in Ekaterinburg, whilst seeming to emanate from the Ural Regional Soviet, was in fact closely monitored by Sverdlov and Lenin, hand in hand with Goloshchekin.” Which is true? Did Lenin know what was going on or didn’t he? She bounces back and forth throughout the book on the topic.

Page 47 she says of Nicholas, “he had been glad to abdicate.” However, according to Massie, it was only after consulting with his generals that he saw his abdication as the only way to save Russians from killing Russians (pages 414-416 of Nicholas and Alexandra).

Page 56 she talks about him being worried about his possessions yet on the prior page she berates him for his simple life – not carrying money, his almost peasant attire.

On page 105, nearly within the same breath she talks of a “doctor” Arkhipov as a physician of good repute yet was described by others as wild and unbalanced.

On and on it goes. So much ping pong.

Finally, by page 134 she describes Lenin in glowing phrases. She doesn’t condone what he does, but if you compare her descriptions of the two leaders, she paints Nicholas as almost an Elmer Fuddish character, bumbling around, but Lenin is portrayed as a strong leader and a brilliant man.

At the end of the book, she gives a four page explanation on why she didn’t use footnotes. “The priority was to create a strong historical narrative that did not enter into academic digression or interrupt the story with debate about contentious issues.” And she even slams Massie’s work as “romanticized.” For those who haven’t read Massie’s two books on the topic, his book Nicholas and Alexandra had a fifty-page bibliography. Hers has fifteen pages. Being someone who has done professional typesetting, I also want to note that Massie’s biblio is typed in a much smaller size than that of Rappaport’s. Just guessing, I’d say if hers were condensed to the size of his type, her biblio would probably only be ten pages – if that. So who really did their homework?

She talks about the commercialization of the Romanovs in Ekaterinburg, namely tourism, but also those cashing in on the mystery surrounding the Imperial family. In my opinion, she’s done exactly what she’s accused everyone else of doing. What a waste of time and money this book was. Oh wait, it was a “National Bestseller!” Not worth it. If you want a real journalistic history, read Robert T. Massie’s works. Good story. Great research. Well cited and footnoted. Skip Rappaport. Horrible.