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Original Title:	Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman
ISBN:	0679456724 (ISBN13: 9780679456728)
Edition Language:	English
Series:	The Romanovs #2
Literary Awards:	PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography (2012), Andrew Carnegie Medal for Nonfiction (2012), Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for History & Biography (2011)

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman (The Romanovs #2)

Robert K. Massie

Hardcover | Pages: 625 pages

Rating: 3.91 | 91372 Users | 3833 Reviews

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Title	:	Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman (The Romanovs #2)
Author	:	Robert K. Massie
Book Format	:	Hardcover
Book Edition	:	First edition
Pages	:	Pages: 625 pages
Published	:	November 8th 2011 by Random House, Inc. (NY)
Categories	:	History. Biography. Nonfiction. Cultural. Russia. Historical. Biography Memoir. Russian History

Description Supposing Books Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman (The Romanovs #2)

Pulitzer Prize winner Massie offers the tale of a princess who went to Russia at 14 and became one of the most powerful women in history. Born into minor German nobility, she transformed herself into an empress by sheer determination. Possessing a brilliant, curious mind, she devoured the works of Enlightenment philosophers, and reaching the throne, tried using their principles to rule the vast, backward empire. She knew or corresponded with notable figures of her time: Voltaire, Diderot, Frederick the Great, Maria Theresa of Austria, Marie Antoinette & John Paul Jones. Wanting to be the “benevolent despot” Montesquieu idealized, she contended with the deeply ingrained realities of Russian life, including serfdom. She persevered, and for 34 years the government, foreign policy, cultural development and welfare of the Russian people were in her hands. She dealt with domestic rebellion, wars & the tides of political change and violence inspired by the French Revolution. Her reputation depended on the perspective of the speaker. She was praised by Voltaire as like the classical philosophers. She was condemned by enemies, mostly foreign, as “the Messalina of the north.” Her family, friends, ministers, generals, lovers and enemies are vividly described. These included her ambitious, scheming mother; her weak, bullying husband, Peter (who left her sexually untouched for nine years after their marriage); her unhappy son & heir, Paul; her beloved grandchildren; and her favorites—the young men from whom she sought companionship and the recapture of youth as well as sex. Here, too, is Gregory Potemkin, her most significant lover & possible husband, with whom she shared a correspondence of love & separation, followed by 17 years of unparalleled mutual achievement. All the qualities that Massie brought to Nicholas & Alexandra and Peter the Great are present: historical accuracy, deep understanding, felicity of style, mastery of detail, ability to shatter myth & a genius for finding and expressing a human drama.

Rating Of Books Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman (The Romanovs #2)

Ratings: 3.91 From 91372 Users | 3833 Reviews

Evaluation Of Books Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman (The Romanovs #2)

I am impressed. Catherine the Great lived from 1729-1796. She was 14 when she first came to Russia, This book covers this entire time period meticulously. I understand how her childhood experiences came to shape her as an adult. I understand her need for love and why she came to have twelve lovers. At the same time she was motivated to seek power. She played a huge role in European history. All of this history is detailed in the book. You meet her as a person and as a leader. Everything one

Where I got the book: ARC from LibraryThing Early Reviewer ProgramA good biography needs to be chunky, informative and as exciting as a novel. Massie does well on all three counts. Catherine The Great is a lively account of both Catherine's life and the slice of European and Russian history into which she was born, and I greatly enjoyed it.Catherine, I learned, began life as a princess in an obscure German minor royal household. By the time she died, she had achieved great things for her vast

This one was clearly a win for me as a biography of Catherine the Great. Massie's writing is clear, brisk and kept the story moving throughout. What I really enjoyed was how he took the time and trouble to show how Catherine carried forward the reforms begun by Peter the Great, and was a monarch who overcame a great deal of adversity to overcome the obstacles of not being Russian, being a woman, and a usurper to boot -- most biographies focus on her time before becoming empress and/or her lovers

Maybe this book is very excellent at what it wanted to be, but I wanted it to be something different. I wanted a history book.1) In trying to be accessible, the prose comes off as simplistic at times. 2) A quibble is the repetition of statements from only a few chapters prior. Those statements do help set the scene for the current action, but are sometimes overdone and unnecessary if the reader had been paying any attention at all to what was just recently covered.3) At one point in the book

I raved about Robert Massie's biography on last Russian tsar and tsarina, Nicholas and Alexandra, and it was one of my favourite reads last year. In it, Massie briefly mentioned that Peter the Great had abolished the law of primogeniture, which required succession of the throne to be male only, starting with the first-born son. As a result, Russia had three empresses in succession: Anna Ioannovna, Elizabeth Petrovna, and Catherine II. The latter two rose to become autocrat through seizing power

Like probably every woman of note in history, open about and unashamed of her sexuality, Catherine the Great is primarily remembered as a power- and man-hungry, salacious, perverted woman. Try googling her name and see how high on the list of the results is the ever-pressing question - Did she really sleep with a horse? Does anyone care about her accomplishments in politics, art and science? Not really. But her sexual exploits? Oh, YES!That's why I appreciate Robert K. Massie's Catherine the

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K Massie is the extraordinary story of an obscure young German princess who travelled to Russia at the tender age of fourteen and rose to become one of the most powerful, and captivating women in history.I had previously read Massie's Nicholas and Alexandra which was wonderful and I was really interested in reading about Catherine the Great.Massie did extensive research on this book. It is Catherines detailed and excellent memoirs and letters