Catherine the Great, a biography by Henri Troyat (1980)

Catherine the Great
by Henri Troyat
Translated by Joan Pinkham
Publisher:  E. P. Dutton
Copyright:  1980
Book Club Edition

Who but Henri Troyat, one of the world's most widely-read authors, a Russian-born Frenchman and the youngest elected member of the French Academy, could have written this biography of the German-born Russian Empress whose adopted language and culture were French, whose most loyal correspondents were Voltaire and Diderot?

From her birth in Stettin in 1729 to her death in 1796, Henri Troyat details the various lives of Catherine II:  the ambitious child, the acquiescent yet firm Grand Duchess, the forceful politician and patron of the arts, the belligerent warmaker and doting grandparents, the lover of men.  Through his exhaustive research and intimate knowledge of Russia, Troyat recreates this extravagant life story in all its splendor and drama.  The reader comes to know a woman who took the world and made it revolve around herself, yet never lost her primitive romantic longings.  We receive vivid portraits of the men and women around Catherine:  her wily predecessor, the Empress Elizabeth, from whom Catherine learned more than just how to curtsy and court; her feeble husband and rival for power, the Prussia-crazed Peter II; her adolescent loves and adult lovers -- that list of "favorites" that reads like an honor roll of aristocratic names:  Potemkin, Poniatowski, Orlov, Rimsky-Korsakov, Lanskoy, Zubov.

Condition:  Used.  Hardcover.  Dust cover is lightly discolored and shows scuffing, edge wear and tear.  Pages may be tanning from age.  Binding is starting to split in places throughout the book, but pages are in tact.

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