A publishing event from one of our most gifted storytellers: the expansive and enthralling history of Russia, from its foundations to the present

The Story of Russia by Orlando Figes (Bloomsbury, £25) looks 900 years earlier, to the national myths that Putin exploited in his invasion of Ukraine. "The country's past will be reinvented by the Russian state as its needs change," Figes observes

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Orlando Figes is an award-winning author and historian, who has held teaching posts at Birkbeck College, University of London and Trinity College, University of Cambridge. He was born in London in 1959 and studied History at the University of Cambridge. Figes is the bestselling author of nine books on Russian and European history, including Natasha's Dance and A People's Tragedy. His books have been translated into over 30 languages.

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A 2022 BOOK OF THE YEAR FOR: Sunday Times * Irish Times * Spectator * Financial Times * Telegraph * Aspects of History 'The history book you need if you want to understand modern Russia' ANNE APPLEBAUM 'A magnificent, magisterial thousand year history of Russia . . . by one of the masters of Russian scholarship' SIMON SEBAG MONTEFIORE **'**A great historian at the peak of his powers' WILLIAM DALRYMPLE '[An] excellent short study' MAX HASTINGS, SUNDAY TIMES 'If you really want to understand Putin's Russia today, anchored in its past of myths, then you simply have to read Figes's superb account' ANTONY BEEVOR **'A lucid chronological journey that ably illustrates how narratives from the nation's past have been used to shape its autocratic present' OBSERVER 'A valuable, instructive overview' INDEPENDENT ------------------------- From the great storyteller of Russia, a spellbinding account of the stories that have shaped the country's past - and how they can inform its present. No other country has been so divided over its own past as Russia. None has changed its story so often. How the Russians came to tell their story, and to reinvent it as they went along, is a vital aspect of their history, their culture and beliefs. To understand what Russia's future holds - to grasp what Putin's regime means for Russia and the world - we need to unravel the ideas and meanings of that history. In The Story of Russia, Orlando Figes brings into sharp relief the vibrant characters that comprise Russia's rich history, and whose stories remain so important in making sense of the world's largest nation today - from the crowning of sixteen-year-old Ivan the Terrible in a candlelit cathedral, to Catherine the Great, riding out in a green uniform to arrest her husband at his palace, to the bitter last days of the Romanovs. Beautifully written and based on a lifetime of scholarship, The Story of Russia is a major and definitive work from the great storyteller of Russian history: sweeping, suspenseful, masterful. ------------------------- PRAISE FOR ORLANDO FIGES 'An outstanding historian and writer, he brings distant history so close that you could feel its heartbeat' KARL OVE KNAUSGAARD 'Figes knows more about Russia than any other historian' MAX HASTINGS, SUNDAY TIMES