From Splendor to Revolution

Starred review from December 13, 2010
While providing insight into famously doomed Empress Alexandra Romanov, Gelardi (Born to Rule) focuses on four lesser known but indomitable women who achieved glory at the height of czarist Russia’s global power only to witness its fall to revolution. Danish-born Empress Marie Feodorovna (Nicholas II’s mother) and three of her sisters-in-law: Greek Queen Olga, Grand Duchess Marie Pavlovna, and Duchess Marie Alexandrovna, developed from four extravagantly indulged girls into dominant matriarchs who still could not prevent the decline of royalty and centuries-old traditions. Relating the drama and tragedy of royal life, Gelardi ably weaves in the extended family ties that connected most European rulers, including Queen Victoria, while also including helpful genealogy charts. Gelardi’s narrative framework of the four Romanov women’s long lives works well to explain not only the realities of the European courts and alliances but also the unique aspects of the Russian dynasty, which suffered repeated assassination attempts even during the age of splendor, resulting in young Nicholas II’s observation of his grandfather’s murder, possibly hastening Russia’s slide to revolution. 16 pages of b&w photos.

December 1, 2010

A thick, murky exploration of Romanov royalty.

Having already slogged through the female descendents of Queen Victoria in Born to Rule (2005, etc.), Gelardi takes on the equally entangled, incestuous ties of the Romanov rulers. The dense narrative tracks four main protagonists of the imperial family: Empress Marie Feodorovna, a Danish princess also called Dagmar or Minnie and wildly beloved of her adopted country; her sister-in-law, Queen Olga of Greece, married to Dagmar's brother George, and ruling over a troubled Greece until his assassination in 1913; Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna, the daughter of Emperor Alexander II, who married Queen Victoria's boorish second son, Alfred, and endured an unhappy marriage in England; and Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna, a society hostess known as Miechen who patronized writers such as Elinor Glyn, whose His Hour (1910) reveals an "imperial Russia on the brink." This era proved the last hurrah for the spectacularly wealthy Romanovs, ushering in dangerous, modern currents such as nihilism. Maria Alexandrovna would witness her father's historic proclamation of the emancipation of the serfs in 1861. With his assassination by extremists in 1881, "Sasha the Bull and Dagmar the adored" ascended to the throne, enjoying a fruitful marriage and children; her warmth and popularity proved a hard act for her ill-fated daughter-in-law to follow. The last half of the book is devoted to the descent into chaos and revolution from 1905 to 1928, forcing a bitter pill on the far-flung dynasty.

Likely to interest only die-hard Romanov scholars. If readers can keep the lineages straight—a big if—the book could prove satisfying.

(COPYRIGHT (2010) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

February 1, 2011

Freelance historian Gelardi (In Triumph's Wake: Royal Mothers, Tragic Daughters, and the Price They Paid for Glory) tells the story of the downfall of the Romanov empire, from Alexander III to Nicholas II, through the distinctive perspectives of four of its powerful if lesser-known women: Danish-born Empress Marie Feodorovna of Russia, mother of the last reigning Romanov, Nicholas II; and her in-laws, Queen Olga of Greece, Duchess Marie Alexandrovna, of both Edinburgh and Saxe-Coburg, and Duchess Marie Pavlovna of Russia. Gelardi does an exceptional job of relating the last years of the Romanovs via the formerly underutilized perspectives of the women behind the men. VERDICT While Orlando Figes's Natasha's Dance: A Cultural History of Russia used Tolstoy's War and Peace as its framework, telling some of the same story, Gelardi offers a more richly detailed account, sure to captivate those with a deep interest in Russian and interrelated European history. Highly recommended.--Lisa Guidarini, Algonquin Area P.L. Dist., IL

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2011
Independent historian Gelardi has done her homework, drawing on an impressive array of primary and secondary sources to deliver a joint biography of four women who were part of Russias imperial dynasty in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Two of the women, Queen Olga of Greece and Marie Alexandrovna, Duchess of Edinburgh, were born Romanovs, and two, Empress Marie Feodorovna and Grand Duchess Marie Pavlovna, married Romanovs. Against the backdrop of a tumultuous period in Russian history, this is really a book about an extended family, with a familys sorrows, joys, squabbles, and scandals, albeit on a very grand scale. Even with the helpful genealogical charts, its easy to get lost in a thicket of names, and the prose style is often as bland as a press release (As patroness of the Russian Red Cross, Marie Feodorovna oversaw the philanthropic organizations numerous important projects, assuring that they ran well or came to fruition). Still, this is an absorbing account that will appeal to Russian history buffs and to those who enjoy reading about royals.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)