Rasputin: The Biography Hardcover – Unabridged, 3 Nov. 2016

Douglas Smith starts his biography of Rasputin by laying out the two competing claims about him that were current during his life and still rumble on today: that he was the 'mad monk', the 'holy devil', debauched and wicked, practising profane religious rites, and with an unhealthy grip on the Tsar; or, that he was a true holy man and visionary, so much so that some groups within the Orthodox church are attempting to have him made a saint.He begins by telling us what little is known of Rasputin's early years in a peasant village in Siberia. Smith shows how difficult it is to sift through the layers of later accounts to get to the truth, especially about someone who lived in a largely illiterate milieu. Some accounts describe him as dirty and uncouth, a thief and a horse-thief, but Smith says the original records don't support these claims. What is true is that he married and had several children, of whom many died. In his late twenties, he took to going off on pilgrimages, apparently a common occurrence in the Russia of that time. However, he looked after his family in financial terms and continued to return to his home village throughout his life. He gradually acquired a reputation as a starets, a kind of religious elder sought out for spiritual guidance.At this early stage, the book is very well written. Notes are kept out of the way at the back, so that the main text maintains a good flow without too many digressions into the minutiae of sources.Smith then takes the tale to the Romanov court, giving the background to the marriage and relationship of Nicholas and Alexandra. He gives a fascinating picture of the various strange religious sects that grew up in late 19th century Russia, and how susceptible the Romanovs and high society in general were to the latest 'holy man' to come along. Rasputin was not the first visionary to be taken up by the Royal couple. But because of the timing, when the state was already cracking, war was on its way and revolutionary fervour was building, he became a focus of much of what people despised about the ruling class.Unfortunately, once these excellent introductory chapters are out of the way, the rest of the book gets bogged down in a morass of rather repetitive detail. It tends to take the format of Smith telling us about reports of some unsavoury episode in Rasputin's life, and then going back over it to show that either it couldn't be true or that it can't be proven. As is always a problem with this period of Russian history, there's a constantly changing cast of characters near the throne, so that names came and went without me feeling I was getting to know much about them. When the book concentrates specifically on the Romanovs it feels focused, and I did get a good impression of how detached they were from the Russian people's opinion of them, especially Alexandra. But Rasputin himself felt ever vaguer as every story about him was shown to be at best misleading and at worst untrue. I felt I learned far more about who Rasputin wasn't than about who he was. Maybe that was the point, but it made for unsatisfactory reading from my perspective.There is a lot of information about the various efforts to persuade the Romanovs to give Rasputin up. For years he was under investigation and being tracked by the authorities, while the newspapers were printing ever more salacious details about his alleged debauchery. Again Smith goes into far too much detail; for example, on one occasion actually listing the names of the eight secret service men who were detailed to monitor him – information that surely should have been relegated to the notes if it is indeed required at all. And again, far more time is spent debunking false newspaper stories than detailing the true facts.I found this a frustrating read. Smith's research is obviously immense and the book does create a real impression of the strange, brittle society at the top of Russia and its desperate search for some kind of spiritual meaning or revelation. But the same clarity doesn't apply to Rasputin – I felt no nearer knowing the true character of the man at the end as at the beginning; if anything, I felt he had become even more obscure. Smith often seems like something of an apologist for him, although he never openly says so. But when, for example, he treats seriously the question of whether Rasputin was actually a genuine faith healer, then I fear the book began to lose credibility with me. The question of whether Rasputin was a debauched lecher living off his rich patrons or a holy man sent by God to save Russia seemed relatively easy to answer, and I found the book tended to overcomplicate the issue in an attempt to portray both sides equally. A bit like giving equal prominence to climate change deniers as to the 97% of scientists who know it to be true.The book has won awards, so clearly other people have been more impressed by it than I was. I do think it's an interesting if over-long read, but more for what it tells us about the last days of the Romanovs than for what it reveals about Rasputin. For me, the definitive biography of this uniquely intriguing life remains to be written.

If you have any interest in Rasputin or Mother Russia, you should read this book. It is compelling. Douglas Smith does not beef up the goblinry of this world famous influencer. Rather he shares information and facts which have recently become available. He sets the record straight against a backdrop of a Russia gripped by cults of unreason. He cites the vocabulary used to denigrate the man. Terminology which is bourne from religious extremities expressed by the schisms in the Russian Orthodox Church, the occult and the eccentric glamour of the bourgeoisie. I struggled a little with the various Russian names but it was well worth it. Rasputin is not beatified by Mr Smith, he presents a truth which is even more remarkable.

Exhaustive - and somewhat exhausting - account of the life and influence of one of history's more infamous characters. Douglas Smith is scrupulous in his treatment of his sources, with no statement, whether of so-called fact or of opinion, failing to undergo his source-checks. Reading this, I certainly felt that no wool was being pulled over my eyes, no presumed 'truth' was escaping unscrutinized. But I have to admit that the character of Rasputin himself, despite his mesmerizing gaze, was oddly uninteresting. Whereas his historical role was undoubtedly crucial, his letters are so disjointed as to be almost incomprehensible (unless regarded as Delphic utterances) and reports of his speech and mannerisms suggest a Tourette's sufferer (a diagnosis not suggested by Smith). The difficulty, for a Western reader, of coping with Russian names, plus the cast list of hundreds, combined to make this a reading experience I struggled to complete.

About halfway through Douglas Smith’s extraordinarily long, (overlong?), book about Rasputin, the surprise is that no-one had murdered him long before it actually happened.Rasputin is part pantomime villain – largely due to the post-death reputation he gained through bad horror films, derogatory biographers and liars, as well as being a debauched, self-styled mystic/holy man. Yet this rough-hewn, semi-illiterate man from Siberia clearly had an aura that Russian historical tradition and the political uncertainties of the times, meant that he could impose himself upon the weakness and vulnerabilities of others.Russian religious and social history has allowed a role for the so-called ‘Holy Fool’ and in some respects Rasputin filled the criteria, but whereas the traditional holy fool had honest naivety to secure their position, he exercised guile and stealth as he played the field. He was clearly very aware of his ability to hold his acolytes with his eyes and awesome presence as well as fulfil their most base fantasies, but Rasputin was also a supreme, but flawed, human chess-player – he played people off against each other with a perverse brilliance. The most obvious example had to be how he manipulated the Russian Imperial Family and particularly the Empress Alexandra, distancing them from ministers, extended family members and by the time of WW1 Rasputin all but controlled Tsar Nicholas with devastating effect. There are gaps and the author admits to the complete and unexplained absence of some papers which could have helped – but as he rightly asserts, we daren’t assume what might be the case, simply because it seems logical and yet it would be incredulous to state.Smith’s previous book, ‘Former People’ was and remains, one of the most heart-breaking books to read, but ‘Rasputin’ inspires a different emotion in me. True, the author debunks a lot of the myths and legends with detailed and a comprehensive assessment of the evidence, much of it new to any researcher, but Rasputin still comes through as a repulsive person to learn about. Whilst there is a great deal of evidence to prove many things and hold Rasputin up as a force to be reckoned with, there are still a few gaps which still leave the reader wondering what sort of hold did he have to receive such protection from the Royal Family and what were the full facts about who actually killed him at the end.The book is fascinating to read and still leaves Rasputin with his reputation as a thoroughly bad lot, but the author needs to edit this down as the evidence is often too much and points are proved over and over again.