ALSO BY SOLOMON VOLKOV
The Magical Chorus:
A History of Russian Culture from Tolstoy to Solzhenitsyn
Shostakovich and Stalin:
The Extraordinary Relationship Between the Great Composer and the Brutal Dictator
Conversations with Joseph Brodsky
St. Petersburg: A Cultural History
From Russia to the West:
The Musical Memoirs and Reminiscences of Nathan Milstein
Balanchine’s Tchaikovsky:
Conversations with Balanchine on His Life, Ballet, and Music
Testimony: The Memoirs of Dmitri Shostakovich
THIS IS A BORZOI BOOK
PUBLISHED BY ALFRED A. KNOPF
Translation copyright © 2011 by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc.
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
www.aaknopf.com
This translation is from an unpublished Russian-language manuscript by Solomon Volkov, copyright © by Solomon Volkov.
All illustrations are from the personal collection of Solomon Volkov.
Knopf, Borzoi Books, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Volkov, Solomon.
Romanov riches: Russian writers and artists under the tsars / by Solomon Volkov; translated from the Russian by Antonina W. Bouis.—1st ed.
p. cm.
“Translation is from an unpublished manuscript”—T.p. verso.
“Published in … Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto”—T.p. verso.
“This is a Borzoi book”—T.p. verso.
eISBN: 978-0-307-59552-2
1. Romanov, House of—History. 2. Romanov, House of—Art patronage. 3. Russia—Kings and rulers—Biography. 4. Authors, Russian—Biography. 5. Russian literature—History and criticism. 6. Artists—Russia—Biography. 7. Composers—Russia—Biography. 8. Arts, Russian—History. 9. Russia—Intellectual life. 10. Russia—History—1613–1917. I. Title.
DK37.8.R6V55 2011
700.9470903—dc22
2010045132
Jacket image: Crest of the Romanov Imperial House, Bettmann / Corbis
Jacket design by Helen Yentus and Jason Booher
v3.1
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Photo Insert
Introduction
PART I
CHAPTER 1
The First Romanovs: From Tsar Mikhail to Peter I
CHAPTER 2
Kantemir, Lomonosov, and Barkov
CHAPTER 3
Catherine the Great and the Culture of Her Era
PART II
CHAPTER 4
Paul I and Alexander I; Karamzin and Zhukovsky
CHAPTER 5
Alexander I, Zhukovsky, and Young Pushkin
CHAPTER 6
Nicholas I and Pushkin
PART III
CHAPTER 7
Lermontov and Briullov
CHAPTER 8
Gogol, Ivanov, Tyutchev and the End of the Nicholas I Era
PART IV
CHAPTER 9
Alexander II, Tolstoy, Turgenev, and Dostoevsky
CHAPTER 10
Herzen, Tolstoy, and the Women’s Issue
CHAPTER 11
Tchaikovsky and Homosexuality in Imperial Russia
PART V
CHAPTER 12
Dostoevsky and the Romanovs
CHAPTER 13
Alexander III, the Wanderers, and Mussorgsky
CHAPTER 14
Nicholas II and Lenin as Art Connoisseurs
Notes
A Note About the Author
A Note About the Translator
Tsar Mikhail (1596–1645), the first in the Romanov dynasty
Ivan Susanin, the peasant who saved Tsar Mikhail, as portrayed by the bass Ossip Petrov, in a photograph
The composer Mikhail Glinka (1804–1857), whose opera A Life for the Tsar (1836) glorified Mikhail’s accession to the throne in 1613
The second Romanov on the throne, Tsar Alexei (1629–1676)
Peter the Great (1672–1725), Tsar Alexei’s famous and controversial son
The poet and diplomat Antioch Kantemir (1709–1744), Tsar Peter’s apologist
The multitalented Mikhail Lomonosov (1711–1765)
Ivan Barkov (c. 1732–1768), the Russian François Villon
Catherine the Great (1729–1796) who was vilified in Soviet times as a “depraved and criminal woman”
The state minister Gavrila Derzhavin (1743–1816), Catherine’s most esteemed poet
Alexander I (1777–1825), Napoleon’s nemesis
Nikolai Karamzin (1766–1826), Alexander’s court historian
Alexander Pushkin (1799–1837), Russia’s greatest poet
The poet Vassily Zhukovsky (1783–1852), Pushkin’s mentor and protector
The popular fabulist Ivan Krylov (1769–1844)
Nicholas I (1796–1855), who called Pushkin “the wisest man in Russia”
The poet Mikhail Lermontov (1814–1841), Pushkin’s heir
Nikolai Gogol (1809–1852), in a drawing by his friend Alexander Ivanov
The painter Alexander Ivanov (1806–1858), Gogol’s protégé
The painter Karl Briullov (1799–1852), Nicholas I’s favored artist
The progressive critic Vissarion Belinsky (1811–1848), Gogol’s early advocate and later foe
The poet Fedor Tyutchev (1803–1873), Nicholas I’s unofficial spokesman
Alexander Herzen (1812–1870), the rebel and literary innovator
A young Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910), whom Turgenev called a troglodyte for his directness and coarseness
Ivan Turgenev (1818–1883), Russia’s most Westernized writer
Alexander II (1818–1881) who was educated by the poet Zhukovsky
Fedor Dostoevsky (1821–1881), the last great Russian pro-monarchist writer, in a wood engraving (1929) by Vladimir Favorsky
Grand Duke Konstantin (1858–1915), the future poet K.R. and Dostoevsky’s ardent admirer
Modest Mussorgsky (1839–1881) in a drawing (1881) by Ilya Repin. Alexander III personally banned a production of his opera Boris Godunov.