Epic in scope, precise in detail, and heart-breaking in its human drama, Former People is the first book to recount the history of the aristocracy caught up in the maelstrom of the Bolshevik Revolution and the creation of Stalin's Russia. Filled with chilling tales of looted palaces and burning estates, of desperate flights in the night from marauding peasants and Red Army soldiers, of imprisonment, exile, and execution, it is the story of how a centuries'-old elite, famous for its glittering wealth, its service to the Tsar and Empire, and its promotion of the arts and culture, was dispossessed and destroyed along with the rest of old Russia.

Yet Former People is also a story of survival and accommodation, of how many of the tsarist ruling class -- so-called "former people" and "class enemies" -- overcame the psychological wounds inflicted by the loss of their world and decades of repression as they struggled to find a place for themselves and their families in the new, hostile order of the Soviet Union. Chronicling the fate of two great aristocratic families -- the Sheremetevs and the Golitsyns -- it reveals how even in the darkest depths of the terror, daily life went on.

Told with sensitivity and nuance by acclaimed historian Douglas Smith, Former People is the dramatic portrait of two of Russia's most powerful aristocratic families, and a sweeping account of their homeland in violent transition.

• We started tracking this book on October 29, 2012.
• This book was $13.49 when we started tracking it.
• The price of this book has changed 19 times in the past 4,714 days.
• The current price of this book is $14.39 last checked 2 hours ago.
• This book is at its lowest price in the past 90 days.
• This lowest price this book has been offered at in the past year is $11.99.
• The lowest price to date was $3.99 last reached on October 19, 2019.
• This book has been $3.99 2 times since we started tracking it.
• The highest price to date was $15.99 last reached on January 21, 2024.
• This book has been $15.99 one time since we started tracking it.

• Politics & Social SciencesSocial SciencesSociologySocial Classes & Economic Disparity
• HistoryRussia

• Publication Date: October 2, 2012
• Text-to-Speech: Disabled
• Lending: Disabled
• Print Length: 496 Pages
• File Size: 22 KB