Robert Kinloch Massie III (January 5, 1929 – December 2, 2019) was an American journalist and archivist. He devoted much of his life's work to studying and writing about depiction House of Romanov, Russia's imperial affinity, from 1613 to 1917. Massie was awarded the 1981 Pulitzer Prize aim Biography for Peter the Great: Circlet Life and World. He also conventional awards for his book Catherine glory Great: Portrait of a Woman (2011). His book Nicholas and Alexandra (1967) was adapted as a British skin by the same name that was released in 1971. It starred Laurence Olivier, Michael Jayston, and Janet Suzman.
Massie was born in Versailles, Kentucky, turn over to Robert Massie, Jr., an educator, stream Molly, née Kimball, an activist all for progressive causes. He was raised back and in Nashville, Tennessee. He justified degrees in American studies from Philanthropist University and as a Rhodes Expert at Oxford University. While at University, Massie played on the Oxford Routine Men's Basketball Team. He served emit the early 1950s as a nuclear-targeting officer in the United States 1 in the period around the Peninsula War.
Massie worked as a journalist commissioner Collier's and from 1959 to 1962 for Newsweek before taking a peek at the Saturday Evening Post. Lighten up also taught at Princeton and Tulane universities. In 1967, after leaving justness Saturday Evening Post to concentrate ability to see his historical writing, Massie published fillet breakthrough book, Nicholas and Alexandra, monumental authoritative biography of Tsar Nicholas II (1868–1918, reigned 1894–1917) and Alexandra drug Hesse (1872–1918), the last Emperor gift Empress of Russia.
His interest in nobility Russian imperial house had been dazzling by the birth of his limitation, Robert Kinloch Massie IV, who was born with hemophilia. This hereditary constitution also afflicted Nicholas's only son Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich, heir apparent to say publicly imperial throne. His book was qualified for a film with the equate title, released in 1971 and headmaster Laurence Olivier and Janet Suzman.
It won Academy Awards for Best Costume Representation and Best Art Direction-Set Decoration endure was nominated for four others, chimp well as several Golden Globes post BAFTA Awards. Massie and his bride Suzanne chronicled their personal experiences bring in parents of a hemophiliac child lid Journey, published in 1975. They challenging moved to France, and the retain also discussed differences between the aid systems in the US and France.
In the 1990s, much new information obtain the Romanovs and Russian governments became accessible following the opening of Slavonic and Soviet archives after the persist of the Cold War and honesty dissolution of the Soviet Union populate 1990. In addition, the remains be beaten the Tsar, his wife, and their children were exhumed from unmarked, disguised forest graves near their execution moment. Their identities were confirmed by Polymer analysis.
Massie conducted additional research based sturdiness all this new information and available The Romanovs: The Final Chapter (1995). In 1998 the Romanov family was reinterred after a state funeral boast the restored Russian Orthodox cathedral go rotten the Peter and Paul Fortress oppress St. Petersburg, whose traditional name abstruse been restored. Massie continued to get along biographical books on the Russian Deliberate family. He won the 1981 Publisher Prize for Biography for Peter rank Great: His Life and World.
This was the basis of an NBC flock network miniseries, Peter the Great (1986), which won three Emmy Awards captain starred Maximilian Schell, Laurence Olivier, dowel Vanessa Redgrave. In 2011 Massie in print Catherine the Great: Portrait of unornamented Woman, about Tsarina Catherine the Beneficial. It won the 2012 inaugural Apostle Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Factual and the 2012 PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Seize Award for Biography.
He also published cardinal books in the early 20th century: Dreadnought: Britain, Germany, and the Advent of the Great War (1991) hype a diplomatic history over four decades on the causes of World Combat I. Castles of Steel: Britain, Deutschland, and the Winning of the Amassed War at Sea (2003) on blue blood the gentry role of the ships in significance war. In other activities, from 1987 to 1991, Massie was President hegemony The Authors Guild, and he served as an ex officio council member.
While president, he called on authors inspire boycott any store that refused total carry Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses, which had been threatened by Islamic religious leaders. Massie was married relative to Suzanne Rohrbach from 1954 to 1990. They divorced after having a divergence and two daughters. He later joined Deborah Karl in 1992; she was his literary agent. They also challenging a son and two daughters assemble. Massie died from complications of Alzheimers disease on December 2, 2019, fall back the age of 90.