Odessa: Genius and Death in a City of Dreams

by Charles King

Overview

Winner of a National Jewish Book Award

"Fascinating.…A humane and tragic survey of a great and tragic subject." —Jan Morris, Literary Review

From Alexander Pushkin and Isaac Babel to Zionist renegade Vladimir Jabotinsky and filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein, an astonishing cast of geniuses helped shape Odessa, a legendary haven of cosmopolitan freedom on the Black Sea. Drawing on a wealth of original sources and offering the first detailed account of the destruction of the city's Jewish community during the Second World War, Charles King's Odessa is both history and elegy—a vivid chronicle of a multicultural city and its remarkable resilience over the past two centuries.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393080520
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	08/13/2012
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	338
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Charles King is a professor of international affairs and government at Georgetown University. A frequent media commentator on global issues, he is the author of Gods of the Upper Air, Odessa, Midnight in the Pera Palace, and other books. He lives in Washington, DC.

Table of Contents

Author's Note 11

Maps 13

Introduction 17

Part I City of Dreams

Chapter 1 The Sinister Shore 23

Chapter 2 Potemkin and the Mercenaries 37

Chapter 3 Beacon 53

Chapter 4 The Governor and the Poet 71

Chapter 5 "There Is Nothing National about Odessa" 97

Part II The Habitations of Cruelty

Chapter 6 Schemes and Shadows 127

Chapter 7 Blood and Vengeance 151

Chapter 8 New World 177

Chapter 9 The Fields of Transnistria 201

Chapter 10 "I Would Like to Bring to Your Attention the Following" 229

Part III Nostalgia and Remembrance

Chapter 11 Hero City 251

Chapter 12 Twilight 269

Chronology 283

Acknowledgments 285

Notes 289

Bibliography 305

Index 325

Editorial Reviews

In his intricately researched new work, King (The Black Sea) brings to life the stories of the Russians, Jews, Turks, Greeks, Italians, Germans, and Romanians that make up the "quintessentially mixed city" of Odessa. Far from the Russian and Ukrainian seats of power, but close to Europe, Asia, and the Mediterranean states, Odessa has always been both a progressive, cosmopolitan trading port and a lawless outpost given to periods of violence, revolution, and economic depression. King effortlessly moves between the city's high points, like the booming grain trade in the late-18th and mid-19th centuries and urban development under the duc de Richelieu, and its desperate times, including the economic collapse associated with the Crimean War and the city's devastating Jewish holocaust at the hands of Romanian occupiers in the 1940s. King weaves into his history the lives of Alexander Pushkin, Isaac Babel, and Sergei Eisenstein, all of whom had connections to Odessa, a city still struggling to understand its place in the world. King's ability to lay bare the city's secrets— both good and bad—gives a fascinating prism through which to observe. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

"Eloquent and engaging."

Moment - Michael Schwirtz

"[A] finely written and evocative portrait.…A worthy tribute to one of Europe’s greatest and least-known cities."

The Economist

"Rich and riveting, complex and compelling, powerful and poetic."

Newsday - Peter M. Gionatti

"Engaging and highly enjoyable…King brings a travel writer’s gift for clear prose and keen observation to history."

The Daily Beast - Matthew Kaminsky

"King skillfully separates myth from fact.…His writing is aesthetic without superficiality, and erudite without pretension. Reading [his] book is like traveling as your best self, the self that you never quite are, ready with every reference, worldly and wise."

Timothy Snyder

King (international affairs & government, Georgetown Univ.; The Black Sea: A History) undertakes to trace the development, history, and character of Odessa, that southern Ukrainian seaport on the Black Sea, while simultaneously studying the impact of the Jewish population of eastern Europe on the region's history and culture. By sharing a series of vignettes, portraits of Odessa through the eyes or actions of some of its more colorful or influential residents, both singular and in group populations, across the ages, King evokes the dichotomy and conflict that lay below the beauty of this rugged city. While enthusiastically written with obvious love and knowledge of Odessa, the parts of the book seem slightly disconnected, as the city's composition and history are perhaps too much for one book. King's narrative and insights do open several avenues for further research and reveal the truths behind many old myths. VERDICT History buffs, religious history enthusiasts, or lovers of that great city will enjoy this work for the portraits shared and the images it evokes.—Elizabeth Zeitz, Otterbein Univ. Lib., Westerville, OH

Library Journal

A history of the site, from its geological structure to its often fragmented, usually fractious, frequently bloody human occupation.

King (International Affairs and Government/Georgetown Univ.; Extreme Politics: Nationalism, Violence, and the End of Eastern Europe, 2010, etc.), who has written extensively about the region and speaks Russian and Romanian, ably glides through Odessa's history, geography and geopolitics. The city of Odessa, situated on the Black Sea's northwestern coast and currently in the hands of Ukraine, was founded in 1794, near Khadjibey, a village of uncertain origins. It began as the ambitious plan of José Pascual Domingo de Ribas y Boyons, who convinced Catherine the Great that the site could become "the jewel of her new southern possessions." Though Catherine died shortly after approving the start of construction, the project kept moving. King highlights the stories of numerous significant individuals whose biographies link to Odessa's. Alexander I appointed Richelieu as city administrator in 1803, and he distinguished himself as a battler against the plague, which continually visited this port city. Pushkin lived and wrote in Odessa. The Charge of the Light Brigade was about 500 miles east along the shore. Isaac Babel, whom King labels "Odessa's greatest writer," wrote about the city. Sergei Eisenstein filmed his 1925 classic Battleship Potemkin there, with its classic scene on the Odessa Steps (King notes how little of the film is accurate). The author also carefully follows the fate of the city during the mid-20th-century's turmoils—control shifted from Soviet to Romanian/German to Soviet to Ukrainian. No history of the city could be complete without an accounting of the vicious, murderous treatment of its Jewish population, a subject King handles well, allowing horrific statistics and wrenching individual human stories to carry the grim message. The author observes that the city today seems more interested in fanciful mythology than in historical memory.

A sharp, graceful account of a fascinating place.

Kirkus Reviews