Caught in the Revolution. Petrograd, 1917

'A past more dramatic than Chekhov, more tragic than Tolstoy and more romantic than Pasternak'

Between the first revolution in February 1917 and Lenin's Bolshevik coup in October, Petrograd (the former St Petersburg) was in turmoil. Foreign visitors who filled hotels, bars and embassies were acutely aware of the chaos breaking out on their doorsteps. Among them were journalists, diplomats, businessmen, governesses and volunteer nurses. Many kept diaries and wrote letters home: from an English nurse who had already survived the sinking of the Titanic; to the black valet of the US Ambassador, far from his native Deep South; to suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst, who had come to Petrograd to inspect the indomitable Women's Death Battalion led by Maria Bochkareva.

Drawing upon a rich trove or material including eyewitness accounts left by foreign nationals who saw the drama unfold, Helen Rappaport takes us right up to the action - to see, feel and hear the Revolution as it happened.