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9781250037794

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Engrossing...With richly detailed event and anecdote. --Liesl Schillinger, The New York Times An engaging and absorbing book. --Jennifer Siegel, The Wall Street Journal Although many of the aristocrats thought the end of their caste 'obvious and unavoidable, ' few foresaw the destruction of a way of life. Smith's engaging and at times heartbreaking account is an essential record of that loss. -- The New Yorker Smith has written a remarkable, deeply affecting book. -- The Dallas Morning News With urgency and precision, [Smith] chronicles the fate of the nobility from the dawn of the revolution...He is invested in their (former) cause, and narrates the events of their lives with passion... Former People is a thorough, extensively sourced history, and also something of a spiritual restitution. --Yelena Akhtiorskaya, The New Republic Former People is ultimately an incredibly readable, vivid, emotional human story of survival, accommodation, and reconciliation. --Sean Guillory, New Books Network A remarkable, deeply affecting book. --David Walton, GuideLive Smith examines the much-neglected 'fate of the nobility in the decades following the Russian Revolution, ' when they were sometimes given the Orwellian title 'former people.' The author of several books on Russia ( The Pearl ; Working the Rough Stone ), Smith focuses on three generations of two families: the Sheremetsevs of St. Petersburg and the Golitsyns of Moscow. He begins by showing their extravagant wealth before the revolution; in the late 19th century, Count Dmitri Sheremetsev owned 1.9 million acres worked by 300,000 serfs. From the 1917 Bolshevik revolution until Stalin's death in 1953, these families and others suffered, at best, severe persecution and impoverishment; at worst, murder by mobs or the secret police, or a slow death in the gulag. In his sprawling but well-paced narrative, Smith tells many memorable stories, including one of V

Stunning and brilliantly narrated.--Rosemary Sullivan The Wall Street Journal

<p> Engrossing...With richly detailed event and anecdote. --Liesl Schillinger, The New York Times <br> An engaging and absorbing book. --Jennifer Siegel, The Wall Street Journal <br> Although many of the aristocrats thought the end of their caste 'obvious and unavoidable, ' few foresaw the destruction of a way of life. Smith's engaging and at times heartbreaking account is an essential record of that loss. -- The New Yorker <br> Smith has written a remarkable, deeply affecting book. -- The Dallas Morning News <br> With urgency and precision, [Smith] chronicles the fate of the nobility from the dawn of the revolution...He is invested in their (former) cause, and narrates the events of their lives with passion... Former People is a thorough, extensively sourced history, and also something of a spiritual restitution. --Yelena Akhtiorskaya, The New Republic <br> Former People is ultimately an incredibly readable, vivid, emotional human story of survival, accommodation, and reconciliation. --Sean Guillory, New Books Network <br> A remarkable, deeply affecting book. --David Walton, GuideLive<p> Smith examines the much-neglected 'fate of the nobility in the decades following the Russian Revolution, ' when they were sometimes given the Orwellian title 'former people.' The author of several books on Russia ( The Pearl ; Working the Rough Stone ), Smith focuses on three generations of two families: the Sheremetsevs of St. Petersburg and the Golitsyns of Moscow. He begins by showing their extravagant wealth before the revolution; in the late 19th century, Count Dmitri Sheremetsev owned 1.9 million acres worked by 300,000 serfs. From the 1917 Bolshevik revolution until Stalin's death in 1953, these families and others suffered, at best, severe persecution and impoverishment; at worst, murder by mobs or the secret police, or a slow death in the gulag. In his sprawling but well-paced narrative, Smith tells many memorable stories, including one of V

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Douglas Smith is an award-winning historian and translator and the author of three previous books on Russia: The Pearl, Love and Conquest, and Working the Rough Stone. Before becoming a historian, he worked for the U. S. State Department in the Soviet Union and as a Russian affairs analyst for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Munich. He lives in Seattle with his wife and two children.

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