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Messages - Ortino

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136
In regard to the Anastasia/World Trade Center comparison, I think there really is no comparison. While the Stone film had 100% cooperation from the real McLoughlin and Jimeno and their families (in order to insure accuracy), the Anastasia film as I understand had no support from any Romanovs and from what I gathered here, the Romanovs were rather upset by the finished product. Furthermore, I would just like to join in with Marlene in saying that the Stone film absolutely 100% did not glamorize anything! What could it have glamorized? There's nothing glamorous about terrorists attacking the twin towers and two husbands and fathers being trapped under the rubble for days. Sure, maybe it was too early, but that doesn't mean it was a musical (title song being of course "Once Upon a September") and that Osama Bin Laden had a talking bat, and the victims turned out to be impersonators, when the real victims had actually died a horrible death. Now that would have been pretty disrespectful to the families, wouldn't it? Gee...where have I heard of that plotline before?

Thank you. As a New Yorker, I find it incredibly offensive (and I do believe offensive is the proper word here) that someone would even try to compare these two events. As Taren so nicely pointed out, there is no comparison between them, so stop trying to create one. And not to get off topic here, but I had no real problem with the creation of the World Trade Center movie. Yes it was a bit hard to watch at times, but I think it was a nice tribute to the heroes of that day, lest we all forget them in the midst of that carnage. Anastasia is not even on the same wavelength.

There doesn't seem to be any middle ground here, so why don't we just let this topic die down and let everyone have his or her own opinions? Nothing of substance is really being added to this discussion at this point.

137
When someone comes in here and says that because there was an error on a date therefore her entire workload is not worth reading.  That, to me, is a personal attack - for one mistake this person's work of more than 10 years is therefore thrown into the trash bin.

Coryne is not the only one who has suffered these sort of attacks.  Penny and Greg undergo this vitriol on a regular basis, usually from people who have never written a book, nor can ever muster the knowledge and effort to write a book, much less get it published for the love of God.

And I am speaking about generalities indeed...this is not directed to you or anyone in particular...let blame lay where it falls, but hnestly the level of criticism I see coming from someone of our fellow posters is simply beyond the pale...it is as if Greg, Penny, Coryne can do no right.  I'd love to see what the rocking chair authors can produce, write and publish...simply dying to see what they can do.

And with that enough said...I've got to go and teach three classes today!

Arturo Beéche


Who ever said that that one error made the entire book not worth reading? I never said anything along those lines. I understand that no book is error-free, but I'm sorry if I start to get anxious when obvious mistakes are made. As I've said more than enough times, IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN A TYPO, but I personally find Lisa's excuse to be unacceptable. It is difficult to be misinformed in this case, particularly when so many sources can provide this information. And for the sake of peace, I think we should avoid bringing up FOTR. I personally believe though that there was enough content in there to warrant questioning.

138
I have nothing against Coryne's works--I enjoyed Little Mother of Russia and Imperial Dancer. In fact, I'm going a paper on the Imperial Russian ballet and using her book quite a bit. Xenia's biography was too disjointed for my taste. However, it does make me anxious when even tiny, entirely correctable mistakes surface. As I've mentoned before, it may have been a typo, but then I begin to wonder whether someone doesn't know their history as well as they seem to, or their manuscripts are not being editted as closely as they should. I've never published anything so I don't pretend to know how the system officially works, but we could find it, why couldn't they?

139
I think most Americans have an awareness about Pearl Harbor that a British writer might not have.

There is no absolutely debate as to when the bombing of Pearl Harbor took place and thereby no reason to get something like this wrong. Also, there are plenty of sources she could have checked if she needed clarification, including the internet.

Quite right Ortino. Such an error is inexcusable no matter what nationality they are.

Margarita



You are both certainly entitled to your opinions. However, this appears to me to be a tempest in a teapot. Coryne Hall works very hard researching her books and is a good writer. That said, nearly everyone I know who writes history makes mistakes. Perhaps you two are among those rare individuals who never make an error and thus feel fully justified being what seems to me to be, so judgemental.

For the rest of us mere mortals, mistakes unfortunately do happen. That you would find such an error - which is most likely a typo that she didn't catch -  "inexcusable" convinces me of one thing. I will really think twice about asking any more of my writer friends to join us here. While they could enrich our discussions enormously, I would not like to see them subjected to such harshness.

 I'm sorry that you have taken this so personally Lisa, yet it seems evident to me that you are simply creating excuses. Would you still not question her work if she wrote that Nicholas' coronation was in 1895 instead of 1896? Perhaps it was only a typo as I've already said, but I sense this is going in the direction of other threads, where only select topics can be discussed and authors unable to be criticized openly.

140
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Read 2/3 of this book on the plane to and from SPB back in September.  Just got around to finishing it this week.  Overall, I found it very interesting and well written.

However, it bothers me a bit that on page 247 it is stated that"n 1942 the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbour and America entered the war."  Nobody's perfect, and all books have errors, but things like this always make me wonder how many more errors, of which I'm not aware, are contained in the book.

I actually never noticed this and now have the same feeling that you do--what other errors have I unintentionally missed? I've always enjoyed and trusted in Hall's works so I'm a tad distraught by this. :-/

It's very difficult to write interesting history as Coryne does and not make a mistake. I think most Americans have an awareness about Pearl Harbor that a British writer might not have. I made several errors in my biographies that are published here on the AP website.

Does my getting Michael A's murder date wrong mean that what I had to say about him is less meaningful? Most people don't think so. At the time I wrote the piece, there was lots of misinformation out there, and unfortunately I used a date from a source that had that fact wrong.

What Hall has to say about MK is far more important than having a date wrong by one year, but this is my opinion.

No, perhaps what is written is not less meaningful, but interpretations of facts do not compare with the facts themselves. If you're going to present something as a fact, do so correctly. It may have just been a typo, but I have difficulty believing that this was due to misinformation. There is no absolutely debate as to when the bombing of Pearl Harbor took place and thereby no reason to get something like this wrong. Also, there are plenty of sources she could have checked if she needed clarification, including the internet.

141
The fact that Anastasia herself was not a legend is true; she was a real person, who lived and breathed like the rest of us, and deserves to have that memory of who she was respected.

However, what the cartoon depicts is not the life story of the 'real' Anastasia; it depicts the 'legend of Anastasia'- the stories and myths about the survivor claimants and conspiracy theories that have sprung up after her death.  The cartoon is about the whole nature of a possible survival, of an 'alternate ending' to the story, if you like.  This film is not about the real Anastasia because the real Anastasia had no part in these myths that sprung up after her death.  If this film is about anyone, it's about the character Ingrid Bergman plays in the live action 'Anastasia' film of, I believe, 1956.

This is why I can't take offence at the film.  It's not about the truth, and it's not based in fact.  It's a cartoon about the legend of Anastasia, not the real Anastasia.  Therefore, there's nothing to get offended about; it's not depicting the person Anastasia was anyway.

Rachel
xx

THANK YOU! FINALLY someone has mentioned the connection with the Ingrid Bergman movie. It's pretty much the exact same story, yet no one seems offended by that one.  Someone from the opposing side care to explain the differences between them?

142
Tsarevich Alexei Nicholaievich / Re: Alexei's Teddybear.
« on: October 10, 2006, 12:52:57 PM »
i have one
goergey bear.
don't know why?
and yes most kids do, im 14 and i know most of my friends do.

cya

alex


Well, that was helpful ::)

Grandduchess, I have a student named Teddy and a colleague called Rabbi. ;)

But anyway, I'm still looking for any information about whether or not it's possible to obtain one of those replicas of Alexei's teddy bear's.  Why didn't i buy one when I had the chance?!  They weren't very expensive.

I doubt you'll be able to get the same exact one unless someone sells it on Ebay, but I've seen modern reproductions of Steiff mohair teddy bears for sale. Amazon for example has one for $140.

http://www.amazon.com/Mohair-Class-Teddy-Bear-12/dp/B0002HYO1M/sr=8-2/qid=1160502533/ref=sr_1_2/002-2930604-2684055?ie=UTF8&s=toys-and-games

143
I own it and love it! Lots of great photos of Moscow, St. Petersburg, and the Russian countryside. I got my copy off Ebay, so I don't know where else a person could buy it. If I see it on Ebay again, I'd be happy to let you know.

145
21? You mean 17....

146
Books about the Romanovs and Imperial Russia / Re: Joyaux des Tsars
« on: October 07, 2006, 05:08:54 PM »
There's an English version called Jewels of the Tsars. Anyone interested can preorder it from Amazon.

147
Quote
Ortino and many others on this very forum have said that the movie was the initial spark for their interest in the Romanovs. Obviously, they didn't just watch the cartoon and "forget all about it." Wouldn't it have been nice if the film had been more correct in the first place, so those people didn't have to debunk a lot of what they thought they knew about Anastasia?

The only problem with "making it correct in the first place" is the question of how far one should go for the sake of accuracy. We both know that Hollywood's main concern is money--let's not beat around the bush here. All those against the film haven't yet answered the fundamental question: how far were they supposed to go? Surely you couldn't expect the entire thing to be accurate, it would draw away their target audience.

Although the Anne Frank example did make me cringe, you are right in some respects. They are similiar, but I feel that the time separating them from us (Anastasia-over 100 years vs. Anne Frank-sixty two years) makes a huge difference. As the last generation who can hear actual accounts of the Holocaust's horrors, making a movie like that about Anne Frank would certainly cause an uproar. Perhaps not so much when our children have children. Time dulls the horror of events so that eventually they become nothing more than a chapter in a history textbook describing them--as much as I hate to say it, that is what Anne Frank and the Holocaust will one day be. The events of that period will always have more of an impact on us than future generations. The same could easily be said about the Revolution and the Romanovs. I personally don't feel this way, but I'm sure others do.

148
Bravo, Rachel. An excellent post that covered just about everything I had to say on the subject. I personally love the movie--like so many others, it was a main factor in my decision to look up the real Romanovs--and the music is absolutely wonderful. I can understand your point Lisa, but I really agree with Rachel on this.

149
I HATE how parents try and alter common names in order to make them more "unique." Ashley, Ashleigh, Ashlee.....Brittany, Britany, Brittanie.... good grief! In fact, I hate common names in general. There's no reason to have three or four Ashleys or Johns in one class.

I also dislike very odd names, particularly those of celebrities.... Moses, Apple, Suri, Coco....  They may sound cute on kids, but what happens when they grow up?!

I think that children can have more unique names like Rowan, Blaise, Harper, Terence etc. without suffering for it, but parents should take care to name their kids something appropriate.

150
The Alexander Palace / Re: Tsarskoe Selo Museum Reserve
« on: September 30, 2006, 09:56:43 PM »
No kidding? Then how is it that so many of the items from the AP survived?

They may have been moved to Pavlovsk and shipped east towards Siberia for safe keeping. I can't recall at the moment.

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