This is a fantastically long book about a couple of people in the 18th century that I had not heard of, other than that I had heard of someone called Catherine the Great. I'm embarrassed that when I visited St Petersburg some years ago I did not recognize the fingerprints of this remarkable lady and her equally (or more) remarkable husband.
Catherine and Prince Potemkin were in the thick of all the political events in the second half of the 1700s. They, especially Potemkin, prosecuted the wars against the Ottomans in the southern reaches of Russia. I makes me wonder if what happened then still affects current events. Was Vladimir Putin merely taking back what was Russia's when he annexed Crimea? (I realise that the Ukrainians believe Potemkin's leadership joined Crimea to Ukraine, not Russia.) Similarly, one sees the seeds of the conflict between Russia (Stalin) and Germany (Hitler) in 18th century tensions and wars between Russia, and Prussia, the Hapsburgs, Poland and Austria.

However, this book is much more than just dry history. It reveals the social history of the top-end of Russian (and European) society. Potemkin may have been (read: was) an extreme example of someone who lived this life, but it's fun and instructive to read. I'm no scholar of Russia history, but I understand that this extreme lifestyle of the Romanovs kindled the revolution some 150-100 years later. This is despite Potemkins apparent kindness and compassion, also for the serfs.

The author appears to have made some remarkable discoveries when searching the records and archives. He seems to have set straight the accepted story that Potemkin was all show and no substance. The book presents the case that Potemkin was one of the most influential people in modern history.

Prepare yourself for reading about lots of things you do not need to know about and will forget; but also prepare yourself to learn a lot more.

One regret - it seems it was first published with colour photos; by paperback version had only low quality black and white photos. ( )

Although very interesting and offering a new perspective on Potemkin I found the book slightly disappointing. The story of Catherine and Potemkin could have been told in 300 pages instead the five hundred of this book.
To my taste too often words like “probably”, “surely”, “undoubtedly” are used. Two other examples of this style: a document “almost smelling of gunpowder” (how does something almost smell?) and “the first truly democratic parliament in Russian history until 1991” (still the first even after 1991). ( )

Brilliant biography of two giants of Russian history. Only too often it is seen that many leaders have intensely troubled domestic lives, but these two are the glimmering exceptions. Montefiore has taken this story out of the relative backwaters of history and made it shine again. ( )

Meticulously researched and absorbingly written, this is a truly excellent biography of the man who was a real power behind the Russian imperial throne in the late eighteenth century—Prince Grigory Potemkin, lover of Catherine the Great and the man who commanded her armies towards military glory. Much of Sebag Monetefiore's research uses sources not previously known to scholarship in general, not just English-language scholarship. Such a wealth of information does lead to the book feeling a little over-populated at times, a little intimidating for the reader who doesn't have a strong background in the history of the era and the author does have a tendency to go off on tangents about some of the (admittedly fascinating in their own writes) people with whom Potemkin and Catherine were in contact throughout their lives. A little more editing would have helped, but one cannot doubt Sebag Montefiore's intellectual rigour, thoroughness and enthusiasm. Absolutely worth reading if you have any interest in Russian history, or in an example of a biography well done. ( )

Who was Potemkin? Most readers from Eastern Europe might have heard about him.
If you studied Modern History then you might have heard about him too.
This leaves lots of people that have never heard about Potemkin. This biography makes it worth to know more about that rather eccentric individual that co-ruled Russia during the late 1700's.

Simon Sebag Montefiore studied History at Cambridge (UK) and therefore learned how to be careful with sources.

He travelled a lot during the 1990's in the previous Soviet Union, especially Ukraine, the Caucasus and Central Asia. Moreover, he searched in Archives in Eastern Europe and gives a select bibliography (pages 569-594). He managed to use primary sources and was careful enough to compare documents about Potemkin, instead of what his political or personal enemies wrote about him. All this has the effect of making this biography more reliable. We get also some maps page 560 and geneological charts of Potemkin and Catherine II.

Chapter 22 gives a description of a typical day in the life of Potemkin. That chapter can be quite amusing, but at the same time describes the life among the elites in St. Petersburg (then capital of the Russian Empire) during the late 1700's. It also describes him as not only tall and handsome, but as a clever politician.

This biography made me know, not only what his friends and lovers wrote about him, but also what his enemies wrote, including lies and biased texts about Potemkin.

Prince Potemkin (from a Polish noble family) and Empress Catherine II (princess from Germany) were not ethnic Russians, but expanded their empire more any other czar since Peter. Several sources describe Prince Potemkin as the secret husband of Empress Catherine II.
S.S. Montefiore was careful enough about this subject, because there are letters and all kinds of messages that signal that they married in secret and behaved like many other rich and powerful couples of the 1700's.

There are also some amusing stories as in page 128 about a possible cast of Potemkin's member found in Hermitage or in page 193 about Russian nurses that "make a constant practice of pulling it when the child is young".

It is typical in many biographies that one ends up describing a person as a hero, saint, martyr or genius. This happened to a certain extent in the later chapters of this biography and made me slightly skeptical. What Prince Potemkin achieved was remarkable both as a secret husband and a kind of co-czar that expanded Russia to the west and the Black sea.
However, he was often described as a victim of slender, envy, lies and evil, especially Frederick William of Prussia and czarevich Paul. in fact, all of them had to put up with that.

On the whole, I can say that this is a biography that afterwards makes you wish to visit all those places in Eastern Europe, like St. Petersburg, Smolensk, Kherson, Odessa and Crimea.
This biography makes you see why Mick Jagger got some satisfaction from reading this biography and called it "a rather wonderful book". ( )