I found this 2016 novel lurking in a forgotten corner of my Kindle library. I bought it last year, apparently. Someone must have recommended it but at this distance I have no idea who. Anyway, whoever you are, thank you, because once I got going, after what seemed like faintly creaky opening chapters, I liked it very much.
Count Alexander Rostov returns home to Moscow from Paris in 1922. He is, of course, an aristocrat. And the Bolshevik revolution of 1917 has deprived him of all assets and status. Now, he is sentenced for life to house arrest in a luxurious Moscow hotel. And that means a servant’s garret because he is forcibly removed from his former suite although he finds ways of spiriting a few family heirlooms to his new quarters.
He’s an adaptable chap who makes friends with hotel staff and the daughter of one of the guests, an engaging, enterprising child named Nina. He works as head waiter in the restaurant. Various hotel managers come and go as the years pass. In places this novel feels like a social satire and the characterisation delights.
Nina, for example, grows up and – now with a life-threatening mission on hand – returns to visit with an unlikely request which changes Alexander’s life. Anna, an actress whose fortunes rise, fall and rise again as “talkie” films emerge is a down-to-earth sensible sort who becomes Alexander’s quasi wife for many decades. And Marina, the woman who does the hotel’s sewing/mending is another rich, skilfully drawn character to treasure. Also in the mix is a one-eyed cat, a Russian chef and a French restaurant manager who used to be a juggler. Then there’s Mishka a dear friend and poet along with an orchestra conductor. It’s colourful stuff.
The writing style is sardonic. It reminded me faintly of Henry Fielding, writing nearly three centuries earlier, in the way it often reaches round the plot and jokily addresses the reader as it jumps about in time right up to the death of Stalin in 1954.
It is, in effect, a fresh and amusing take on the effects and aftermath of the Revolution from an unusual point of view. It’s written in the third person but it’s Alexander we’re with almost all the time. He’s very rounded and definitely not the sort of stereotypical entitled toff the Bolsheviks routed out so ruthlessly, usually because anyone with wealth was perceived as evil by definition. On the other hand he is what he is. Naturally, he has memories and he loves the furniture and clothes he has managed to retain. But he also believes in luck and effectively becoming a father, has, he asserts, has turned out to be the most important thing which ever happened to him. He’s good company and a fine conversationalist so his daily meetings with the other two key hotel staff are pacey. And the tense relationships he has with different hotel managers over the years are nicely done. He’s also capable of clever subterfuge when he needs it.
Does he really stay at the Metropol for the rest of his life? Read A Gentleman in Moscow and find out.
This book was a worldwide best seller so I’m not sure how it passed me by so completely. Towles is on record as saying that it was inspired by his observation of permanent residents in luxury hotels in Switzerland combined with his knowledge of Russian history. There is also, I gather, a 2024 TV series starring Ewan McGregor. I might dig that out now to see what writer/director/ producer, Ben Vanstone did with this entertaining book.
And as for me, perhaps I need to travel more widely. Serendipitously, I seem to have spent a lot of time (as it were) in Russia this year. First there was a biography of Stalin, then a novel about Shostakovich (which I didn’t feature here), a biography of Diaghilev and now this. I’ve never been to Russia, and as things currently are, I’m hardly likely to but it begins to feel as if I have.
Next week on Susan’s Bookshelves: The Violin Maker’s Secret by Evie Woods
