The Friend
Brian Masters
The Life and Times of Grigorii
Ra
Alex de Jonge (Collins £9.95)
rendered her totally dependent o un savoury peasant with the staring eyes, n t hsi t s p o u the
en,
point where he virtually controlled deci- sions of state. Alexandra was unintelligent, inflexible, suspicious and morbidly religious. She went in for table-turning and was always on the look-out for saints. Exert- ing a disproportionate influence on we Tsar, who signed himself 'your poor little weak-willed hubby', she was responsible fo_r, the disastrous seclusion of the Imperial family, bereft of friends or advisers. The quality of her mind was mediocre and her emotional stability unreliable. What finally unhinged her was the revelation that here only son was an incurable haemophiliac. I; anyone could save her boy from death an U her husband from politicians, he would have the mightiest role in the WO' Rasputin fitted the bill in both respects.
By any standards, Grigorii Rasputin
a most unusual man. He could never hae been anonymous. Virtually illiterate, hel.iv- ed with wife and three children in a tinY Siberian village until a religious experience impelled him to spend three months 1n monastery and brought him to the attention of gullible churchmen, who valued his 013; musty simple faith and thought him sent by God. That he was also obsessed with nse,,,g escaped their notice, at least Rasputin gained entry into houses vvtth carpets, then into mansions, finally into palaces, preaching a garbled message which, because it was incomprehensible' must be correct. The idea that Russian peasant religiosity was simple and good is," fiction which the author blames largely upon Tolstoy. In fact, as Alex de Jonge shows, it had a history of blind nastiness' involving dismemberment and live burials' enough to make the most seasoned rea'... shudder. One of the great virtues of this book is its detailed exploration of °I., religious background to Rasputin's incred. ble story, the inheritance of the Old Beli,eA and its weird sectarian practices. The u'" Belief satisfied Rasputin's shallow and he was particularly keen on that part 01. it which said that in order to expiate sin You, had to commit sin first. Hence he seduce nt ladies in salons by convincing them t1.1_ they had to sleep with him to test their resistance, and if they did not resist they would have to try harder next time. He even had them licking jam from his fingers (t, demonstrate freedom from pride) and
nature„.
washing him between the legs (to conclue temptation), as steps on the path towards grace through orgasm.
Rasputin never seems to have doubted his sexual attractiveness; his was the certainty of the thick-headed. Since women were top- pling over at his approach, one can hardly criticise him. He was scornful of those who labelled him a saint, while enjoying the fruits of their adoration. That such a man should become the only intimate of the royal couple (with the exception of the nice but dotty Anna Vyroubova), indeed their Mentor, is one of the supreme tragedies of history. How it could have happened is the question to which Rasputin's new bio- grapher addresses himself, and he answers it admirably, by sweeping aside the legend and Coming to terms with the individual. Rasputin the 'mad monk' was neither a monk nor insane. He was never Alexandra's lover. Presenting himself as non-partisan', Mr de Jonge gives ample space to Rasputin's good qualities — his in- difference to rank, his ability to gain con- fidence by asking personal questions nor- mally forbidden in an artificially polite society, his genuine horror of war, his PoPularity with children (who are far harder to deceive than adults). Never pick flowers, he said, for 'it was cruel to take life by force'. He was not actually wicked , just unrestrained and selfish. More important than anything else, he had an uncanny knack of calming people in distress, a characteristic which made him precious to the royal household. 'Better one Rasputin than ten fits of hysterics a day' said the Tsar, and one sympathises immediately, seeing the tenseness at Tsarskoe Selo which the unmannerly peasant alleviated. The cause of Alexandra's hysteria was more often than not the feeble health of the Tsarevich, and here Mr de Jonge allows that Rasputin did unquestionably save the little boy's life more than once simply by his Presence. This power to heal is one of the e. nduring mysteries of the case (another be- ing Rasputin's immunity to cyanide poison- TO. To Alexandra there was no mystery. The Friend worked miracles because he was God's messenger. The most sensible view is "iced by Mr de Jonge's Russian grand- mother, who says that she always thought Rasputin as the most successful Whisperer' (practitioner of folk medicine) of all time. Anyway, his 'whispering' stop- ped the boy's bleeding and gave Rasputin a hold over the Empress which was quite understandable but ultimately catastrophic. e appointed and sacked ministers, granted favours, told the Tsar what to do and when EC/ do it, all the time indulging in drunken orgies and lecherous adventures which Nicholas and Alexandra simply refused to credit. His influence demolished respect for the royal family and created a scandal of unparalleled dimensions which helped to make the Revolution possible. The man may have had a colossal personality, but he a Maly compared with the vast legacy of his career.
, Alex de Jonge superbly creates a fully comprehensive portrait of his subject in a
compelling narrative which hooks the reader's interest and never lets go, while keeping a dispassionate objective distance. Being half-Russian he is blessed with two advantages over most of his predecessors: he is able to use contemporary Russian sources, newspapers as well as books, and he understands the elusive Russian character, giving the reader insights into Russian words and attitudes without which he would still be floundering in wonder.
Alexandra was impressed by Rasputin's intuitive powers, a mistake for which she and eventually the whole of Russia paid a price. One does not have to be a spiritualist for a lingering seed of superstition to be awakened by the story of Grigorii Rasputin. He prohesied that the Tsar and Tsarina would see his village before they died — a preposterous idea. But they did. They pass- ed it on their last journey to Ekaterinberg.
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