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Solovki: The Story of Russia Told Through Its Most Remarkable Islands: Prof. Roy R. Robson

Located in the northernmost reaches of Russia, the islands of Solovki are among the most remote in the world. And yet from the Bronze Age through the twentieth century, the islands have attracted an astonishing cast of saints and scoundrels, soldiers and politicians. The site of a beautiful medieval monastery-once home to one of the greatest libraries of eastern Europe-Solovki became in the twentieth century a notorious labor camp. Roy Robson recounts the history of Solovki from its first settlers through the present day, as the history of Russia plays out on this miniature stage. In the 1600s, the piety and prosperity of Solovki turned to religious rebellion, siege, and massacre. Peter the Great then used it as a prison. But Solovki's glory was renewed in the nineteenth century as it became a major pilgrimage site-only to descend again into horror when the islands became, in the words of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the "mother of the Gulag" system. From its first intrepid visitors through the blood-soaked twentieth century, Solovki-like Russia itself-has been a site of both glorious achievement and profound misery.

Review:

I had to order this book for a Russian History class. My prof is the author of this medium sized factual book and it has been a wonderful read. Full of little histories and facts that make reading easy and pleasant, it is an incredibly insightful look at how Russia has grown into the state it is now. The spiritual facts are introduced with a touch of mysticism, which is paralleled in Russia's orthodox history. A wonderful addition to any Russian history lovers' collection, and a small sample that easily fills for those not familiar.

Review:

Roy Robson's Solovki is a wonderful book. Robson had the inspired idea to write the history of Russia as reflected in the extraordinary past of the White Sea Solovetskii Island. There more than five hundred years ago two saints established a monastery that became legendary for its beauty, wealth and sanctity. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the monastery became a religious battleground between the state-approved Russian Orthodox and the so-called Old Believers, who considered themselves the true bearers of Orthodox piety and ritual in Russia. In the nineteenth century the monastery was a site of war (it was attacked by British warships during the Crimean war) and of pilgrimage (thousands of simple Russians visited it every year). In the twentieth century, from the early 1920s to 1939, it was the location of an infamous prison camp, described by Solzhenitsyn in the Gulag Archipelago. Today the Orthodox Church has re-established the monastic presence on Solovki and the place has been recognized by the United Nations as an international cultural treasure. Robson's history deftly analyzes each stage in the complex history of Solovki in prose that is a clear as the water of the White Sea on a calm day. The book is a deft portrait by a master craftsman. Splendid!

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Rating:
2.5 out of 5 by Book123