59 pages • 1-hour read
I Was Anastasia: A Novel
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Background
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of graphic violence, mental illness, and death.
Historical Context: The Bolshevik Revolution in Russia and the Fall of the Romanovs
A combination of war, famine, and poverty caused widespread social unrest throughout Russia in the early 20th century. In previous centuries, Russia was ruled by a tsar, the equivalent of an emperor. Tsar Nicholas II succeeded his father, Alexander III, in 1894. Workers and farmers struggled in difficult living conditions, and many felt that Nicholas and the aristocratic class were holding back progress that could benefit the common people. In 1905, Russian guards fired on a protest group of unarmed factory workers, an event later called Bloody Sunday. This led to further protests and the movement now referred to as the Revolution of 1905.
Russia entered World War I in 1914 on the side of the Allied forces, along with France and Great Britain, but their military suffered enormous losses. The resulting food shortages weakened the economy further. While Nicholas was away at the front trying to rally soldiers, the tsarina, Alexandra, aided the rise to power of her favorite advisor, the widely hated Grigory Rasputin. A group of Russian nobles revolted and murdered Rasputin due to his perceived influence over the royal family. In what is now called the February Revolution of 1917, protesters in Petrograd (the capital, formerly known as St. Petersburg) named the Duma (the council or parliament) the head of the provisional Russian Republic led by Alexander Kerensky. The Duma then forced Nicholas to abdicate and tried to set about making social reforms.
However, Russia’s continued involvement in the war led to worsening food shortages, economic woes, and further unrest. In October 1917, according to the Julian calendar which Russia then followed (as opposed to the Gregorian calendar followed by the rest of Europe and the Americas), Vladimir Lenin, leader of the Bolshevik party, declared himself head of the Russian government. This led to civil war. The Red Army of the Bolsheviks supported a communist form of government led by soviets or councils of working-class citizens. Their opponents, the White Army, which was made up of monarchists and other dissenters, wanted a kind of parliamentary government like the Duma governed by the ideals of democratic socialism. In 1923, the Red Army prevailed, and the Soviet Union was formed.
The Romanovs became Russia’s ruling family in 1613 when Michael Romanov was elected tsar. His grandson, Peter the Great, turned Russia into an empire. Nicholas II’s father, Alexander III (who ruled from 1881-1894), was viewed as a reactionary whose autocratic style held Russia back from modernizing like the rest of Europe. Alexander married Dagmar of Denmark, who became Tsarina Maria Feodorovna (the Dowager Empress of the novel) and was widely beloved by the Russian populace. Nicholas’s wife, Alix of Hesse, later known as the Empress Alexandra, was disliked by the populace because of her ties to the German states, her opposition to social reforms, and her reliance on Rasputin, who persuaded her that he could heal her son’s hemophilia.
When Nicholas was forced to abdicate, his younger brother, Michael, was initially offered the role of leader of Russia. Michael declined and was later confined and executed by the Bolsheviks, as were several others in the Romanov family. The Dowager Empress left Russia during the Revolution, along with her two daughters, Olga and Xenia. Olga eventually settled in Copenhagen with her mother, while Xenia and her family moved to the United Kingdom.
Alexandra’s sister, Elizabeth, married a Russian grand duke and was also executed by the Bolsheviks during the revolution. Her other siblings, the Princess Irene and Ernst Louis, the Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine, survived World War I. Initially, the Bolsheviks kept it secret that they had executed the tsar along with his wife and children. Only at the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 did the rest of the world learn the location of the executions and burial. Conflicting information and persistent rumors led Alexandra’s siblings and the remaining Romanovs to hope for survivors, going so far as to meet and interrogate various pretenders, including Anna Anderson.
Sociohistorical Context: Anna Anderson
Over the years, many individuals have claimed to be the descendants of the Russian royal family. One Russian woman, Nadezhda Vasilyeva, claimed in 1920 to be the Grand Duchess Anastasia. She was held by the Bolsheviks in various prisons and labor camps, then moved to an institution where she spent the remainder of her life. Anna Anderson became the most well-known of the Anastasia imposters, maintaining this identity until her death in 1984. In 1991, after the murders of the Romanovs came to light, the remains of nine persons were found outside Ekaterinburg, and DNA testing identified them as the tsar and tsarina, three of their daughters, and their four servants. In 2007, the remains of Tsarevich Alexey and the fourth sister were discovered and identified. Tissue samples taken from one of Anna’s surgeries in 1979 were later tested and DNA results matched that of the Schanzkowska family, conclusively identifying Anna as Franziska Schanzkowska.
Franziska was born in 1896 to a Polish family. In 1916, records indicate that she was diagnosed with mental illness. An accident with a grenade in a munitions factory where she worked during the war is also thought to have taken place in 1916. As a young woman, she was rescued after she attempted suicide by jumping into a canal in Berlin. She was admitted to Dalldorf Asylum and had no identifying information on her and refused to tell staff her name. Another patient, Clara Peuthert, thought Anna looked like the Grand Duchess Tatiana and drew attention to this claim. Anna eventually identified herself as the Grand Duchess Anastasia.
Lawhon’s novel tracks closely with the documented events around Anna’s life, though she condenses events and omits or consolidates certain characters in order to streamline the narrative. Ernst Louis, Anastasia’s uncle, hired the private investigator who discovered in 1927 that Anna was in fact Franziska Schanzkowska. Her brother Felix later reportedly told his family he did not claim Anna as his sister because he thought she was better off that way. Anderson was reportedly frequently combative and difficult to live with, and she spent time in various institutions throughout her life. While she was never officially or legally recognized, her supporters, including Gleb Botkin, tended to be devoted to her.
Anderson’s claims inspired a play by the French playwright Marcella Maurette, which is referred to in the novel, as well as the 1956 film Anastasia, for which actress Ingrid Bergman won an Academy Award. The 1997 animated film Anastasia portrays an orphaned young woman, Anya, who is pursued by the villainous Rasputin after he destroys the rest of her family. These are among the more well-known literary interpretations. Despite the DNA evidence, theories continue to be proposed that Anastasia, or others, might have escaped murder at the hands of the Bolsheviks.
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