The tsar whisperer
How an irresistible Russian peasant charmed the king — and paid for it with his life
Rasputin Faith, Power, and the Twilight of the Romanovs by Douglas Smith Farrar, Straus and Giroux
by MACKENZIE DAWSON
There lived a certain man in Russia long ago
He was big and strong, in his eyes a flaming glow
Mostpeople looked athimwith terror and with fear
But to Moscowchicks hewas such a lovely dear
He could preach the bible like a preacher Full of ecstasy and fire But he also was the kind of teacher Womenwould desire Ra ra Rasputin Lover of the Russian queen So goes “Ra Ra Rasputin,” the 1978 song by Boney M. It wasn’t exactly a mainstream hit, but the fact that he was celebrated in a cheesy 1970s song is pretty good evidence that Rasputin, the wild-eyed Siberian holy man who gained the ear of Romanov Tsar Nicholas and his wife, Alexandra, still manages to capture the popular imagination.
One-hundred years after his murder by Russian nobles eager to end his sway over the tsar, a new book called “Rasputin: Faith, Power, and the Twilight of the Romanovs” by Douglas Smith aims to unravel some of the complexities of the man long thought of as a “mad monk” and dark consigliere to the royal family. (Even his eyes were thought to have magical powers.)
“I think the wildest rumor was that he was sleeping with the empress
and her daughters [grand duchesses Anastasia, Olga, Tatiana, Maria],” said Smith. “There was a good deal of gossip and chatter that he was sneaking into the palace when Nicholas was away.”
Born Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin in 1869 in the Siberian village of Pokrovskoye, very little was known about the first three decades of his life. It was not until he ventured to St. Petersburg that he would become known — and, eventually, notorious.
Very quickly after arriving in the elegant city in 1903, he became a darling of the elite and could be found hanging out in gilded drawing rooms, where he excited and alarmed people by kissing everyone and addressing them as “ty,” the informal form of “you” in Russian, which was unheard of at the time.
“He was a curiosity when he came to Petersburg and started to make his way around the salons. He was like an exotic animal,” said Smith. “Most of those people [the aristocracy] had no connection with the way peasants lived. It was like ‘Radical Chic’ [the 1970 Tom Wolfe essay that lampooned the upper class and their attachment to radical political causes] — ‘Let’s invite the Black Panthers to our Upper East Side apartment.’ ”
“People began to whisper and to say that he had indeed divined the truth in certain matters, that he had great insight, and an atmosphere of heightened nervous energy began to take hold of the kind that can also be experienced in monasteries around seers,” wrote historian Vladimir Bonch-Bruevich.
About a year and a half after arriving in the city, Rasputin was introduced to the tsar and tsarina by their mutual friend, Grand Duchess Militza Nikolaevna. “Tuesday. A cold windy day . . . Had tea with Militsa and Stana. We made the acquaintance of a man of God — Grigory, from Tobolsk province,” the tsar noted in his diary on Nov. 1, 1905. Rasputin, for his part, wasted no time, sending the tsar a frank and friendly advice-filled letter four days after their meeting.
“Everyone else around them was fawning and following etiquette, and here’s this man from the people, who dared to call it like it is, tell them what he thought,” said Smith. “[Nicholas and Alexandra] found [him] very refreshing as a connection with the vastness of peasant Russia. They were very isolated in the palace.”
The three became very close, with Rasputin continuing to advise Tsar Nicholas on policy matters. But it was his counsel on the treatment of their son Alexei, a hemophiliac, that really endeared Alexandra to him. At one point, the tsarevitch was close to death; the Last Sacrament was administered. She telegraphed Rasputin and asked him to pray for Alexei. His response was immediate: “God has seen your tears and heard your prayers. Do not be sad. The little boy will not die. Do not let the doctors torment him too much.” The next day, there was little improvement. But the following day, the bleeding stopped. The boy would live. Predictably, the Duma, or Russian parliament, was threatened by the influence of this outsider, who often counseled the tsar to do things that ran counter to their interests. “Russia is going through dark, difficult days. The public conscience is deeply aroused. Some sort of evil spirit from the Middle Ages has risen before us,” one Duma member said in a speech that denounced Rasputin. OnDec. 29, 1916, a group of nobles lured Rasputin to Yusupov Palace and gave him food and wine laced with cyanide. This, amazingly, had no effect. They then shot him at close range, shot him again, beat him and then tossed his body into a freezing river for good measure. The royal family reacted with shock; upon learning the news, the tsar stood up and left a meeting; Alexandra was in denial. Only two years later, they would be dead, too, murdered with the rest of their family in a basement in Yekaterinburg. The Bolsheviks reported that each member of the family had been wearing an amulet with Rasputin’s image and a prayer around their necks. They had believed in their mysterious friend to the very end.