WEBVTT - S4 – Interview 1: Douglas Smith 0:00:01.120 --> 0:00:04.320 Welcomed Unobscured, a production of I Heart Radio and Aaron Minky. 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:10.479 We begin the interview series for Unobscured Season four with 0:00:10.640 --> 0:00:15.240 Dr Douglas Smith. Dr Smith is the author of Rasputin, Faith, Power, 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:18.040 and the Twilight of the Romanovs, just one of six 0:00:18.079 --> 0:00:21.120 books he has published on Russia. Douglas is an award 0:00:21.120 --> 0:00:24.040 winning historian and his writing has been published into more 0:00:24.079 --> 0:00:27.319 than a dozen languages. Anyone who has researched the life 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:30.200 of Grigory Rasputin knows just how difficult it can be 0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:33.120 to separate the man from the myth. As you'll know 0:00:33.200 --> 0:00:36.279 well from this season of Unobscured, Dr Smith's work has 0:00:36.320 --> 0:00:39.960 become an essential guide to that difficult task. His original 0:00:40.000 --> 0:00:43.600 research set a new standard of understanding the Siberian mystic, 0:00:43.880 --> 0:00:46.480 from his early life to the details of his murder 0:00:46.520 --> 0:00:49.599 and the importance of his legacy. Both the man and 0:00:49.680 --> 0:00:52.360 the myth matter, and there's no one better for walking 0:00:52.400 --> 0:00:56.080 through the details than Douglas Smith. Since his book was published, 0:00:56.080 --> 0:00:58.800 its reach has grown year by year, and so has 0:00:58.840 --> 0:01:01.960 the respect he earns for experts and curious readers alike. 0:01:02.320 --> 0:01:06.600 Were delighted to have his perspective on Unobscured researcher Sam 0:01:06.640 --> 0:01:09.640 Alberty and writer Carl Nellis talked to Douglas about the 0:01:09.680 --> 0:01:12.840 revelations that came from taking a new look at Rasputin. 0:01:13.360 --> 0:01:16.160 It's a pleasure to share this conversation with all of you. 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:20.640 This is the Unobscured Interview series for season four. I'm 0:01:20.720 --> 0:01:31.880 Aaron Manky for Unobscured Podcast. I'm Carl Nellis, and I'm 0:01:31.920 --> 0:01:35.240 here with my co producer Sam Alberty. Today we're talking 0:01:35.319 --> 0:01:40.240 with Dr Douglas Smith, an award winning historian and translator. 0:01:40.480 --> 0:01:43.240 Douglas Smith is the author of six books on Russia. 0:01:43.800 --> 0:01:47.560 It's a privilege to have him join us. Uh. Douglas, 0:01:47.560 --> 0:01:53.280 welcome to an Obscured Podcast. Thanks for having me. Um 0:01:53.320 --> 0:01:58.400 So your book on Rasputin, Rasputin, Faith, Power and the 0:01:58.440 --> 0:02:03.400 Twilight of the Romanovs. It's a landmark study in Gregory 0:02:03.480 --> 0:02:08.280 Rasputin's life and his influence. And as I've just mentioned, 0:02:08.360 --> 0:02:11.040 you've written a lot on Russia. What what brought you 0:02:11.600 --> 0:02:15.639 to such an important project, uh, and one that focused 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:21.240 on Rasputin in particular. Well, I had never really planned 0:02:21.240 --> 0:02:23.960 to write a book about Rasputin and to spend like 0:02:24.040 --> 0:02:28.400 six years of my life full time doing it. Um 0:02:28.560 --> 0:02:32.440 I wrote a book before this, called Former People, which 0:02:32.600 --> 0:02:35.480 told the story of what happened to the Russian nobility, 0:02:35.760 --> 0:02:39.680 the Russian one percent, if you will, following the revolutions 0:02:39.760 --> 0:02:43.040 of nineteen seventeen with the collapse of the Romanov dynasty 0:02:43.240 --> 0:02:46.360 and then Lennon and the Bolshevik seizure of power at 0:02:46.400 --> 0:02:49.839 the end of the year. Um and I was fascinated 0:02:49.880 --> 0:02:52.320 by the story. You know, in the United States we 0:02:52.320 --> 0:02:55.360 always love to hear about, you know, rags to riches. Well, 0:02:55.919 --> 0:02:58.600 the story of the nobility was the ultimate story of 0:02:58.680 --> 0:03:01.680 riches to rags. And while I was researching that book, 0:03:01.680 --> 0:03:04.720 I had to dig deep into the final years of 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:08.360 the Romanov dynasty, so the first years of the twenty century, 0:03:09.000 --> 0:03:11.880 and in every source I seemed to poke my nose into, 0:03:12.320 --> 0:03:15.280 there was the specter of of respute and hanging hanging 0:03:15.320 --> 0:03:19.200 around in the background. And so I became more and 0:03:19.240 --> 0:03:22.240 more curious about them. Simply as a result of that 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:27.480 that previous research. Um and Uh as a figure, as 0:03:27.480 --> 0:03:30.000 a character, as a as a as a myth and 0:03:30.040 --> 0:03:34.680 a legend, he began to attract my attention. Um And 0:03:34.720 --> 0:03:40.320 then also purely for sort of um marketing purposes. I 0:03:40.360 --> 0:03:42.880 realized this was about that we were going to be 0:03:42.960 --> 0:03:47.400 coming up on the centenary of the murder of Resputing 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:51.040 in sixteen and then the centenary of the Russian Revolution 0:03:51.560 --> 0:03:55.440 UM and publishers do love these big hundred year retrospective 0:03:55.440 --> 0:03:58.520 type publishing opportunities. So I thought, well, this is a 0:03:58.520 --> 0:04:02.000 perfect time to uh to revisit uh and try to 0:04:02.080 --> 0:04:06.720 really better understand this amazingly important character. Douglas sam here 0:04:07.120 --> 0:04:11.120 speaking of the of the sources in that um in 0:04:11.200 --> 0:04:14.120 this work. One of the things that was so illuminating 0:04:14.160 --> 0:04:17.520 to me through as I was reading your book is 0:04:17.560 --> 0:04:21.840 how complicated the just trying to trace out the history 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:26.800 of that is, even as he looms uh so ever 0:04:26.880 --> 0:04:30.800 presently in the background, UM, can you describe your work 0:04:30.839 --> 0:04:33.400 a little bit and analyzing the sources that have formed 0:04:33.480 --> 0:04:37.120 the traditional history of the Rasputin myth and some of 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:39.720 the what has made it, what makes it so difficult 0:04:39.720 --> 0:04:44.080 to dig into, like a a kind of unblemished history 0:04:44.120 --> 0:04:47.400 of Rasputin. Yeah. Well, you know, when I decided I 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:50.919 want to do to the book, UM, I I told 0:04:50.960 --> 0:04:52.480 myself that I wasn't going to go down to the 0:04:52.560 --> 0:04:56.719 university library and pull out the last fifteen biographies of 0:04:56.720 --> 0:04:59.920 resputing and take notes and sort of regurgitated all which 0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:02.240 is kind of what has happened for a long time now, 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:05.040 So you get the same myths and stories and distortions 0:05:05.040 --> 0:05:09.080 and lies and airs told and retold and retold. Um 0:05:09.240 --> 0:05:12.400 So I set myself the task of really digging into 0:05:12.480 --> 0:05:14.919 the archives and going back to the original sources, the 0:05:14.920 --> 0:05:19.080 original letters and documents and memoirs and police reports and 0:05:19.080 --> 0:05:23.000 and things like that, which basically no one has really done. 0:05:23.480 --> 0:05:26.240 Not necessarily their fault, but for most of the Soviet 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:30.359 period documents on respute and were not available. It was 0:05:30.440 --> 0:05:32.919 sort of a taboo subject. You just couldn't study it 0:05:32.960 --> 0:05:36.400 in depth. Um So I came along at a good 0:05:36.440 --> 0:05:39.040 time when a lot of this stuff that for decades 0:05:39.080 --> 0:05:41.400 no one had been allowed to see, I was given 0:05:41.440 --> 0:05:46.080 access to. So I spent years in archives across Russia 0:05:46.120 --> 0:05:49.200 and Moscow and Petersburg, but also out in Siberia where 0:05:49.200 --> 0:05:52.720 he was from places like to Bullskin to mien Um. 0:05:53.200 --> 0:05:55.960 And then I also was really interested in in finding out, 0:05:56.040 --> 0:06:00.000 you know, what might be available about him outside of Russia. 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:03.600 So I was to Paris and Berlin, to Vienna, London, 0:06:03.680 --> 0:06:08.240 Oxford UM, the Hoover Institution at Stanford. So I really 0:06:08.320 --> 0:06:12.239 ransacked the archives and was able to dig up tons 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:17.120 of of amazing original source material that had escaped the 0:06:17.160 --> 0:06:21.479 attention of historians before. And in so doing too, I 0:06:21.520 --> 0:06:24.280 think dispel with a lot of the myth and and 0:06:24.400 --> 0:06:27.800 conjecture and air, and I hope create a much more 0:06:27.839 --> 0:06:34.279 realistic portrayal of this person. That's great. That really comes 0:06:34.320 --> 0:06:36.760 through to us of course, to the readers of your book, 0:06:36.800 --> 0:06:39.320 and we hope that people who listened to to our 0:06:39.360 --> 0:06:42.200 program will go and read your book because your researches 0:06:42.320 --> 0:06:46.680 is amazing. Let's let's go back to some of what 0:06:46.720 --> 0:06:50.240 you found. You mentioned Siberia there before your work. As 0:06:50.279 --> 0:06:52.360 you say, much of what we you know, quote, knew 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:56.800 of Recputan's life in Siberia prior to his coming to 0:06:56.839 --> 0:06:59.520 the capital and rising to prominence. It was a mystery. 0:07:00.279 --> 0:07:04.839 So maybe for recipients early life, what did you discover 0:07:04.960 --> 0:07:08.960 when you did that work, Well, that's that was one 0:07:09.000 --> 0:07:12.160 of the real challenges is basically the first thirty years 0:07:12.240 --> 0:07:15.119 or so of his life or a giant black hole 0:07:15.960 --> 0:07:20.000 for which we have very little reliable information and in 0:07:20.000 --> 0:07:24.840 a way that lack of information, lack of documentation has 0:07:24.920 --> 0:07:29.680 allowed UM people to create all sorts of lies and 0:07:29.800 --> 0:07:33.080 stories about the young Resputin. There was nothing to refute 0:07:33.080 --> 0:07:34.920 those stories pretty much, and so it was sort of 0:07:34.960 --> 0:07:37.040 an open book. You could write as you saw fit, 0:07:37.520 --> 0:07:39.720 and so people tended to talk about him as this, 0:07:39.880 --> 0:07:46.560 you know, horse thieve, this, reprobate this, UM, you know, 0:07:46.640 --> 0:07:50.040 hooligan if you will, UM. And I decided that, okay, 0:07:50.040 --> 0:07:52.280 there's got to be something in the archives out in 0:07:52.320 --> 0:07:55.960 Siberia that will dispel these stories or prove them to 0:07:56.000 --> 0:07:57.600 be true. You know, I was open to whatever I 0:07:57.720 --> 0:07:59.920 might find. And so one of the things that was 0:08:00.040 --> 0:08:05.520 interesting is UM into bolsk Uh in Siberia, which has 0:08:05.800 --> 0:08:09.160 a fairly good sized archive and has information on Resputing 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:11.760 that no one had really seen before. I was able 0:08:11.840 --> 0:08:14.600 to dispel once and for all the story that he 0:08:14.640 --> 0:08:16.440 had been a horse thief in his youth, which is 0:08:16.440 --> 0:08:18.440 one of these things that gets repeated over and over 0:08:18.480 --> 0:08:22.840 and over. But I did find uh some information that 0:08:22.920 --> 0:08:27.280 had escaped previous historians, which was a a small notice 0:08:27.520 --> 0:08:33.480 in a document that recorded UH arrests and UM brief jailings, 0:08:33.480 --> 0:08:37.000 if you will, of people in the village of Pakrovskaya, 0:08:37.040 --> 0:08:39.079 which is where he was from, not far from to 0:08:39.240 --> 0:08:44.240 bullsk and as a teenager, young Grigory Resiput and had 0:08:44.320 --> 0:08:46.880 in fact been thrown as my dad would say, thrown 0:08:46.880 --> 0:08:49.760 in the uscal uh put In the local pen, the 0:08:49.800 --> 0:08:53.000 local jail for a couple of days for using abusive 0:08:53.080 --> 0:08:56.600 language towards the local mayor. Now, this was kind of 0:08:56.600 --> 0:09:00.840 an interesting discovery, um in that it does give us 0:09:00.880 --> 0:09:03.880 like one of the few little kernels of real factual 0:09:03.920 --> 0:09:07.200 information about his youth, and it does, in my reading 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:11.640 of it, suggests that he was sort of a ruffian um, 0:09:12.360 --> 0:09:14.440 a little bit of a rebel, a little bit of 0:09:14.440 --> 0:09:17.440 a troublemaker, even as a young person. So that was 0:09:17.440 --> 0:09:19.559 one of the few things that I found that would 0:09:19.640 --> 0:09:22.160 add to the story. But chiefly what I found there 0:09:22.200 --> 0:09:25.559 was the lack of evidence, uh to dispel so many 0:09:25.600 --> 0:09:30.000 of the false stories. One of the things that that 0:09:30.320 --> 0:09:32.560 you point out, especially in the beginning of your book, 0:09:32.640 --> 0:09:34.560 and seems to be a theme that comes out, is 0:09:34.600 --> 0:09:39.160 that Rasputin's background, just being from Siberia is something that 0:09:39.320 --> 0:09:42.560 really follows him and plays plays into his relationships even 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:45.520 in the capital Um. And it seems like Raspute, or 0:09:45.600 --> 0:09:49.880 that Siberia rather occupies the kind of a complicated place 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:54.120 in in broader in the broader identity of Russia. Can 0:09:54.160 --> 0:09:58.000 you describe some of the general contours of the place 0:09:58.200 --> 0:10:03.680 of of Siberia and cybera Arians within Russian identity and consciousness, 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:07.280 especially kind of as they're seen in as they would 0:10:07.280 --> 0:10:10.840 have been seen in like European Russia, or well, obviously 0:10:10.880 --> 0:10:14.120 for for so much of the world, I mean, Siberia 0:10:14.360 --> 0:10:18.920 conjures up all sorts of uh, exotic notions if you will, 0:10:19.000 --> 0:10:22.120 you know, bears walking down the street, and the vastness 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:27.160 of the place, it's extremes of of temperature um and 0:10:27.200 --> 0:10:29.800 the fact that so for so much of Russian history 0:10:30.240 --> 0:10:33.840 Siberia has been a dumping ground for for criminals and 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:38.760 political prisoners. It's, you know, this vast space of that 0:10:38.840 --> 0:10:43.400 was some sort of you know, enormous um ice clad jail, 0:10:43.520 --> 0:10:46.880 if you will, for for for centuries um. And while 0:10:46.960 --> 0:10:50.760 there is obviously a great deal of truth to that um, 0:10:50.800 --> 0:10:54.120 Siberia is a more complicated place than one might originally think. 0:10:54.559 --> 0:10:57.520 And it was also um a place of freedom, which 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:02.240 seems somewhat contradictory, but One of the things that distinguishes Siberia, 0:11:02.360 --> 0:11:05.560 which is that area east of the euro Mountains that 0:11:05.679 --> 0:11:08.920 divides Europe from Asia in that part of the world, 0:11:09.440 --> 0:11:13.439 is that there was never any serfdom in Siberia. Now, 0:11:13.480 --> 0:11:17.280 serfdom was basically a form of slavery, if you will, 0:11:17.640 --> 0:11:22.320 that existed in the European part of Russia. Um, much 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:26.360 of much of the Russian populace under the Tsars were 0:11:26.400 --> 0:11:30.280 serfs um, which by sort of the beginning of the 0:11:30.360 --> 0:11:34.080 nineteenth century really was not all that different in many 0:11:34.080 --> 0:11:37.280 ways from American slavery. Serfs could be bought and sold, 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:41.000 they could be abused, uh and were abused, work to 0:11:41.080 --> 0:11:44.200 the bone, and what have you. Well, the peasants of 0:11:44.240 --> 0:11:47.679 Siberia were not owned, they didn't have landlords, they didn't 0:11:47.720 --> 0:11:51.679 have masters, and so they they had a more independent 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:56.160 kind of spirit than the serfs in European Russia. And 0:11:56.200 --> 0:11:59.440 I think this was central to understanding Resputing and who 0:11:59.480 --> 0:12:01.120 he was. He had never been a surf, he had 0:12:01.120 --> 0:12:04.599 never been owned. He was born a peasant, but a 0:12:05.080 --> 0:12:08.280 free peasant. And I think this is an important aspect 0:12:08.320 --> 0:12:13.040 of his biography and background that um explains part of 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:15.280 how he managed to do what he do. It's hard 0:12:15.320 --> 0:12:20.720 to conceive of a Russian serf um growing up in 0:12:20.760 --> 0:12:25.920 such a harsh type of a system, displaying the level 0:12:26.040 --> 0:12:30.080 of of independence and freedom of spirit that resputant had 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:35.440 mm hm. And you note that in that early period 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:40.200 of his life he becomes a pilgrim, and that the 0:12:40.200 --> 0:12:43.160 themes that you were able to discern from studying the 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:48.240 whole arc of his life, um, they really coalesced during 0:12:48.280 --> 0:12:51.520 that period. Could you talk a little about what those 0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:57.880 themes were and how they developed for the pilgrim Rasputin? Yeah, Well, 0:12:57.920 --> 0:13:01.920 the the Russians had this notion of the holy pilgrim 0:13:02.240 --> 0:13:07.319 Russian ortstrani and by roughly n there was maybe as 0:13:07.320 --> 0:13:11.199 many as a million of these people, typically typically peasants 0:13:11.720 --> 0:13:17.200 who picked up and wandered the vast Russian Empire in 0:13:17.280 --> 0:13:21.880 search of spiritual and religious enlightenment. Um. They tended to 0:13:21.920 --> 0:13:24.520 live on the edge of poverty. Some of them went 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:29.360 around in fetters, chains um. Some of them, even resputing, 0:13:29.400 --> 0:13:31.560 who went around in fetters for a while, would try 0:13:31.600 --> 0:13:34.800 to sort of mortify the flesh and deny themselves the 0:13:34.840 --> 0:13:39.920 pleasures of any flesh, whether it be you know, food, um. 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:44.520 Resputing for long stretches as a holy pilgrim, would not 0:13:44.640 --> 0:13:48.520 change his clothes or underwear, lived in the wilds, lived 0:13:48.559 --> 0:13:52.319 out of doors UM in search of enlightenment that they 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:56.920 might find in churches and monasteries and from priests um 0:13:56.960 --> 0:13:59.520 all over the country. And they would simply live off 0:13:59.559 --> 0:14:02.640 of alms and things like that as they went. So 0:14:02.679 --> 0:14:07.320 this was resputants university, if you will. UM. Sometime roughly 0:14:07.320 --> 0:14:09.920 when it was around twenty eight years old, he apparently 0:14:10.000 --> 0:14:13.360 had some sort of a religious experience of vision or something, 0:14:13.840 --> 0:14:15.880 and he got up and would leave home for long 0:14:15.960 --> 0:14:19.760 stretches and travel on foot all over the Russian Empire 0:14:20.520 --> 0:14:24.360 UM as one of these pilgrims seeking enlightenment, and it became, 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:28.720 if you will, his university. He learned the Bible inside 0:14:28.760 --> 0:14:31.800 and out and was able after that to quote long 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:35.560 stretches of the Bible from memory. UM. He had this 0:14:35.640 --> 0:14:40.520 incredible power of speaking about the Gospels in a way 0:14:40.560 --> 0:14:44.880 that was direct, honest, earthy, and full of the fire 0:14:45.840 --> 0:14:48.000 of a true believer that he had gained through these 0:14:48.040 --> 0:14:50.200 years as a pilgrim. And this is something that sort 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:53.680 of set him apart um. And he also, if you will, 0:14:54.480 --> 0:14:59.000 learned all about the social order of Russia. He learned 0:14:59.040 --> 0:15:01.920 about the nobile, he learned about peasants, he learned about 0:15:01.920 --> 0:15:07.800 convicts and criminals, UM, And he came to see the 0:15:07.840 --> 0:15:11.080 world and to see Russia in one in which the 0:15:11.160 --> 0:15:16.000 peasants were the backbone of the country. UM and the 0:15:16.000 --> 0:15:19.280 elites were in a sense sort of parasites that lived 0:15:19.320 --> 0:15:22.160 off of the labor of the common of the common man. 0:15:22.280 --> 0:15:25.960 And these were themes that very much shaped his his 0:15:26.120 --> 0:15:31.320 thinking about Scripture UM, about the place of religion, and 0:15:31.320 --> 0:15:34.040 and the sort of critique that he kind of developed 0:15:34.040 --> 0:15:42.440 about the Russian social order. So, of course, uh speaking 0:15:42.480 --> 0:15:46.000 of the of the elites and and recipient's life as 0:15:46.000 --> 0:15:51.160 a pilgrim, of course that that life brings him to St. Petersburg. 0:15:51.880 --> 0:15:54.560 And could you tell us a bit about what St. 0:15:54.560 --> 0:15:58.080 Petersburg was like at the turn of the century, what 0:15:58.080 --> 0:16:01.960 what concerns dominated life there, and what might have attracted 0:16:02.040 --> 0:16:06.160 Rasputin to come to that city in. St. Petersburg was 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:10.040 obviously the capital of the of the Russian Empire, and 0:16:10.200 --> 0:16:13.240 had been since the beginning of the eighteenth century when 0:16:13.240 --> 0:16:16.280 it was first created out of swamps by the Czar 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:20.240 Peter the Great Um and by you know, nineteen hundred, 0:16:20.280 --> 0:16:23.720 around the time when Rasputin showed up, it was a 0:16:23.840 --> 0:16:30.240 very sort of vibrant, growing metropolis, full of enormous ghettos 0:16:31.160 --> 0:16:35.720 of poor, really miserable living conditions, on top of which 0:16:35.960 --> 0:16:41.320 sat a glittering small elite of the very wealthy and powerful. 0:16:41.800 --> 0:16:47.160 But for a figure like Resputant, who was clearly very ambitious, 0:16:47.240 --> 0:16:51.240 he he had he had enormous hopes for himself and 0:16:51.280 --> 0:16:54.040 his career as as sort of you know, an itinerant preacher, 0:16:54.120 --> 0:16:56.960 if you will. Um he was also very much a 0:16:57.000 --> 0:17:01.480 devout monarchist and believed in the institution of the monarchy 0:17:01.560 --> 0:17:06.159 and saw himself as a real devoted son subject of 0:17:06.280 --> 0:17:09.160 the of the Emperor of Russia. And I think much 0:17:09.200 --> 0:17:12.600 of what drove him to the capitol was was this 0:17:12.680 --> 0:17:15.480 sort of, if you will, kind of vainglory that he 0:17:15.560 --> 0:17:18.359 had that somehow he was going to reach the top 0:17:18.800 --> 0:17:22.480 of Russian society, that he had this message to bring 0:17:22.560 --> 0:17:24.840 to the elites of Russia and even bring to the 0:17:25.440 --> 0:17:27.960 palace of the Tsars. And I think this is ultimately 0:17:28.560 --> 0:17:32.840 what um led him from one provincial city after another 0:17:33.400 --> 0:17:35.960 to make his way to Petersburg, where he arrives either 0:17:36.040 --> 0:17:38.719 in nineteen o four or nineteen o five from what 0:17:38.760 --> 0:17:45.760 we can tell. Sometimes this period or the years leading 0:17:45.840 --> 0:17:49.959 up to it is called the Silver Age of Russia. 0:17:50.000 --> 0:17:52.879 Can you explain how people have used the Silver Age 0:17:52.920 --> 0:17:56.679 and what is usually meant by that? Right? So, the 0:17:56.760 --> 0:18:01.400 Silver Age refers to a period roughly from eighteen ninety 0:18:01.720 --> 0:18:04.760 until the outbreak of World War One in nineteen fourteen. 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:08.879 And it's contrasted with the so called Golden Age of 0:18:08.880 --> 0:18:12.320 of Russian literature, which was sort of the first decades 0:18:12.400 --> 0:18:15.840 of the nineteenth century with the greatest of all Russian 0:18:16.119 --> 0:18:19.720 writers and poets Alexander Pushkin. So what you had in 0:18:19.760 --> 0:18:24.760 the Silver Age contrast with that was another flowering of 0:18:24.760 --> 0:18:29.280 of literature, art, culture, music that was going on in 0:18:29.359 --> 0:18:35.200 that fantasy eclip period um where you had incredible writers 0:18:35.320 --> 0:18:41.320 like Ahmatova coming along uh yes, say in Alexander Bloch 0:18:42.280 --> 0:18:45.560 and and many others that you had great painters like Rubel, 0:18:46.080 --> 0:18:51.160 You had composers like Rachmaninoff and Rubinstein. Um, the ballet 0:18:51.359 --> 0:18:54.639 was at its height under Um, under Jago liv and 0:18:55.240 --> 0:18:59.240 artists like Alexander ben Wah. So there was this like outpouring, 0:18:59.480 --> 0:19:03.679 this literally sort of bubbling of artistic expression that was 0:19:03.720 --> 0:19:07.600 happening during that period. UM. And this it's interesting is 0:19:07.640 --> 0:19:12.080 that Resputant's life and career overlaps almost exactly with with 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:14.200 the Silver Age, So in some ways you could view 0:19:14.280 --> 0:19:18.160 him as as another expression of this this fervent bubbling 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:30.200 over of of artistic and intellectual curiosity and productivity. You mentioned, Uh, 0:19:30.240 --> 0:19:34.159 of course that Rasputin was a UM, a devoted monarchist 0:19:34.240 --> 0:19:37.639 and had the these you know, these ambitions for UH, 0:19:40.720 --> 0:19:43.080 led by vain glory, to reach reach the pinnacle, reach 0:19:43.080 --> 0:19:46.080 even the czar and the emperor. UH. And the role 0:19:46.200 --> 0:19:49.639 of the autocracy just in general and Russia is is 0:19:49.680 --> 0:19:52.960 so central, it seems like to the story. UM, how 0:19:52.960 --> 0:19:57.120 would you describe the role that that the autocracy did 0:19:57.160 --> 0:20:01.760 play in in Russian life and consciousness? UM, and especially 0:20:01.840 --> 0:20:06.200 the connection between the czar and the people. Well, by 0:20:06.240 --> 0:20:10.439 this time, under Zar Nicholas the second, who would who 0:20:10.520 --> 0:20:13.440 would be the last? Are? The Romanov's had ruled rush 0:20:13.520 --> 0:20:17.560 of Um for three hundred years since sixteen thirteen when 0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:20.679 the first Romanoff was put on the throne. UM, So 0:20:20.720 --> 0:20:25.840 there's been three hundred years of of Romanov monarchy. The 0:20:26.200 --> 0:20:30.480 later decades of the dynasty under Nicholas. The second our 0:20:30.640 --> 0:20:35.520 our period of dynamic um change. The economy is taking off, 0:20:35.640 --> 0:20:41.280 it's growing, you get an increasingly sizeable um urban middle class, 0:20:41.320 --> 0:20:45.520 you get the development of of an urban proletariat. So 0:20:45.600 --> 0:20:47.840 on one hand, what you have is this sort of 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:53.080 dynamism and and change going on in the economy and 0:20:53.200 --> 0:20:56.800 in society at large. And then you have this static 0:20:57.560 --> 0:21:02.080 um political system that goes back to the early seventeenth 0:21:02.080 --> 0:21:06.119 century of you know, one ruler with all supreme power 0:21:06.359 --> 0:21:09.800 apparently handed down from God. And so there's this growing 0:21:09.880 --> 0:21:15.680 tension between a dynamic and developing society and a rigid 0:21:16.320 --> 0:21:20.000 um political system that doesn't reflect the change um. And 0:21:20.080 --> 0:21:24.040 it's it's it's very much one of the struggles that 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:27.399 the Nicholas faces as czar is how to handle this, 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:32.480 and he does and absolutely horrifically appallingly bad job of 0:21:32.600 --> 0:21:36.679 handling it um. And it's obviously what then leads to 0:21:36.880 --> 0:21:40.600 revolution and the downfall of the monarchy in nineteen seventeen. 0:21:41.320 --> 0:21:45.400 Part of the problem is is Nicholas his own personality. Uh, 0:21:45.440 --> 0:21:48.399 he's weak, he's passive, he's indecisive, and he feels that 0:21:48.480 --> 0:21:53.199 he was handed this this duty upon coming to the 0:21:53.200 --> 0:21:55.880 throne following the death of his father, Alexander the Third, 0:21:55.920 --> 0:21:58.639 who was a true sort of tyrant who ruled with 0:21:58.680 --> 0:22:00.960 an iron fist. And and he doesn't sort of have 0:22:01.160 --> 0:22:04.920 that character that his father does, and he waffles, and 0:22:04.960 --> 0:22:07.960 he prevaricates, and he's not always sure what the right 0:22:08.000 --> 0:22:11.680 move is to make, and he basically in many ways 0:22:11.680 --> 0:22:15.520 sort of uh fumbles the situation. And he lives in 0:22:15.560 --> 0:22:19.280 a world that is completely cut off from the realities 0:22:19.320 --> 0:22:22.280 of the people that he rules over. Um. They live 0:22:22.280 --> 0:22:26.760 in a gilded cage. The Romanovs do partially because they 0:22:26.800 --> 0:22:29.879 know that there are segments of society with the want 0:22:30.119 --> 0:22:32.680 the monarchy swept away, and not only that would would 0:22:32.800 --> 0:22:37.200 want to kill him, and there are attempts on his life. Um. 0:22:37.240 --> 0:22:41.760 Alexander the Second was blown up by terrorists in eighty 0:22:41.880 --> 0:22:45.199 one UM. And so they're they're very much in a 0:22:45.240 --> 0:22:50.840 way isolated from the society that they rule over. You 0:22:50.920 --> 0:22:56.680 mentioned their Nicholas's personality. Of course, he marries Alexandra. Could 0:22:56.680 --> 0:23:01.240 you describe her past personality, maybe in comparison to Nicholas, 0:23:01.400 --> 0:23:05.560 or or how her personality interacted with this society that 0:23:05.640 --> 0:23:11.480 she stepped into when she married him right. So obviously, Alexandra, 0:23:11.800 --> 0:23:16.080 it's important to to know was was German born Um 0:23:16.119 --> 0:23:21.679 marries into the Russian Romanov family Uh, and it was 0:23:21.720 --> 0:23:26.800 a truly um loving marriage. They were utterly devoted to 0:23:26.840 --> 0:23:29.760 each other their entire life. They were utterly devoted to 0:23:29.880 --> 0:23:33.359 their children. But by temperament they were in many ways 0:23:33.560 --> 0:23:38.760 very different from each other. Whereas Nicholas was again sort 0:23:38.760 --> 0:23:43.679 of weak and and indecisive and and passive, if you will, 0:23:44.240 --> 0:23:52.000 she was UH brittle yet determined, UM very much someone 0:23:52.080 --> 0:23:56.360 who was very shy and awkward in public settings, always 0:23:56.359 --> 0:24:00.720 preferred to be uh in the privacy of the family 0:24:01.160 --> 0:24:04.600 and not out in public in a sense doing her 0:24:04.960 --> 0:24:12.040 royal duties as the Empress. She was profoundly mystical, spiritual, 0:24:12.880 --> 0:24:17.600 UM believed in all sorts of what to us today 0:24:17.600 --> 0:24:22.480 would seem in many ways as strange um occult kind 0:24:22.520 --> 0:24:27.119 of notions. UM. And she was somebody who, though she 0:24:27.280 --> 0:24:32.200 loved Nicholas, dearly saw him for who he was, and 0:24:32.280 --> 0:24:35.679 it must be said, saw the weaknesses of his character, 0:24:36.040 --> 0:24:39.080 and so spent much of her her life trying to 0:24:39.119 --> 0:24:41.760 find ways to support him in his role as are 0:24:42.280 --> 0:24:45.160 and trying to to do what she could, in her 0:24:45.280 --> 0:24:48.199 understanding of it, to make him a more effective and 0:24:48.240 --> 0:25:01.159 more powerful ruler. You mentioned Alexandra's mysticism, which which seems 0:25:01.160 --> 0:25:03.639 to show up certainly, not just in her, but it 0:25:03.640 --> 0:25:06.640 seems seems like it's a kind of almost a trend 0:25:06.800 --> 0:25:11.639 among elites in the capitol um. What was going on 0:25:11.680 --> 0:25:15.359 in Russia at that time, during this Silver Age that 0:25:15.640 --> 0:25:20.639 made the members among the aristocracy so interested and eager 0:25:20.680 --> 0:25:25.000 in these kind of eccentric religious figures and occultism, mysticism, 0:25:25.040 --> 0:25:28.760 things like that, right with the sort of the the 0:25:28.800 --> 0:25:31.960 tight geist, if you will, of of fantasy eclo. Russia, 0:25:32.160 --> 0:25:34.959 like other parts in Europe. Actually, to be honest, at 0:25:34.960 --> 0:25:38.960 the time, there was there was very much a fascination 0:25:39.119 --> 0:25:43.720 with with with dark forces at play, with a sense 0:25:43.800 --> 0:25:46.200 that they were on the verge of some sort of 0:25:46.600 --> 0:25:49.719 apocalyptic change, that it was in some ways the end 0:25:49.760 --> 0:25:54.879 of times um. And there was a profound um fascination 0:25:55.160 --> 0:26:03.960 with with mysticism, spiritualism, the cult uh you know, seances 0:26:04.000 --> 0:26:08.040 and table turning and and all sorts of these sorts 0:26:08.080 --> 0:26:11.879 of things. Hypnotism was was quite popular at the time, 0:26:12.280 --> 0:26:14.320 and that's one thing that's often forgotten, I think when 0:26:14.320 --> 0:26:17.320 people write about Nicholas and Alexandrin and their relationship with 0:26:17.359 --> 0:26:20.520 Respute and um is it wasn't like they were the 0:26:20.560 --> 0:26:23.840