Rasputin and Media Bias

Greetings! I am very happy to have discovered this site. I returned to the States two years ago after spending 23 years abroad, the last 10 years in Russia. In the early 1990s, I spent time researching Gregory Rasputin in the Russian State Archives in Moscow.

Upon returning to the States, I decided to finally work on getting my Master's degree, which I am now completing in the field of Communication Studies at a university near Omaha, Nebraska. For one of my classes, I am working on a paper on the subject of commonly held images and opinions of Gregory Rasputin as propagated by the media, both today and in the past, in order to see if, and how, bias has played a role in these stories.

One of my assignments for this class was to start a blog on Rasputin and invite all who are interested to drop by and leave a comment. If any of you would be interested, I would certainly appreciate any comments you might want to make. You can find the blog at: http://gregoryrasputin.blogspot.com/

I’ve learned so much by reading through all the discussions on this site. Thanks in advance. I look forward to learning as much as possible from all of you and contributing, whenever I can, to the discussion.

Todd

Thank you, I am always interested in Rasputin! Please tell us more!

Todd
Zdrazjvuite!

I do hope that you will look at the handful of rasputin oriented threads at this site...they may be of interest to you ...though I doubt they will tell you anything new.

Good luck with your thesis!
R.

  HI Todd- I am thankful to find lots of good info about Rasputin!
I am doing a similar subject for my dissertation and pleased to find lots of help from this forum. I am reading an excellent biography on the romanov and it has some brilliant view on Rasputin-
Robert.K.Maisse
Nicholas and Alexandra-the tragic and compelling story of the last Tsar and his family
ibsn-0-575-40006-4
its a brilliant account- and has lots of juicy info!
hope u find it a useful read

Good luck to you, Todd.

I'm working on a similar project for an undergraduate senior thesis that (partially) involves the portrayal of the Imperial Family in the media. In fact, I just spent yesterday at the Hoover Library (Stanford) gently pawing through some satirical journals from 1905-1907. I know this is little out of range date-wide for Rasputin, but it was my first stab at their collection.  

That said I understand that Hoover has quite a bit more satirical works in their collection, but I’ll have to go back and do some serious investigation to uncover later press coverage of the Imperial Family.  I lucked out with the 1905-07 collection since they’re all housed in one box! If I find anything interesting I’ll pass the info on to you.  There is one file in particular that might be useful, but out of common courtesy I’d like first dibs. I’m going to look at this file on Wednesday (11/3) or Friday (11/5), but I should be done with it after these dates.  If it seems relevant to your topic, I’ll pass on the file number.  I don’t know how much time you have to work on your project, but perhaps you could order it through Inter-Library loan?

Here’s a link for Stanford’s library database.  (Assuming that you’re not familiar with the collection, limit your search to libraries: Hoover Institution Archives and Hoover Institution Library.)

http://library.stanford.edu/webcat

Another useful source, although it’s probably considered to be a secondary source at your level of study is a book edited by James von Geldern and Louise McReynolds:

von Geldern, James and Louise McReynolds, eds.  Entertaining Tsarist Russia: Tales, Songs, Plays, Movies, Jokes, Ads and Images from Russian Urban Life 1779-1917. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press. 1998.

The entry I think might be helpful to you is  “Rasputin’s Nighttime Orgies (the Tsarist Miracle-Worker) A Tale in One Act." Author: V.V. Ramazanov (1917)

From the intro to the piece (385-386):
“One of the first signs that the February Revolution of 1917 had demolished censorship was the proliferation of cabaret theaters.  Cabarets could react quickly to current events and changing regulations, responding with a flood of political burlesque and semi-pornographic titillation.  The Bolsheviks were a favorite target of satire, but the two tastes were best satisfied by the now-mythic figure of Grigory Rasputin, who had mesmerized and supposedly seduced the traitorous German Tsaritsa, and led Russia to catastrophe.  The subject had been taboo throughout the war, even after his murder in December 1916.  This piece, which opened May 11 in the Nevsky Farce Theater, was just one of many on the subject. Using broad humor, it combines sexual myths of Rasputin and the Decline of the Romanovs with the ethnic and class politics of the time.”  

Amy