On Nineteenth Century Russia, Seen Through the Eyes of a French Traveller. A Resurgence of Old Polemics?
On Nineteenth Century Russia, Seen Through the Eyes of a French Traveller. A Resurgence of Old Polemics?

Summary/Abstract: Published in the mid nineteenth century, “Lettres de Russie. La Russie en 1839”(Letters from Russia. Russia in 1839) is not only the travel journal of a Europeannobleman visiting the Far East, but also a mirror image - albeit, of course, tainted byits timely context - of a society situated too far away from the perception and genuineknowledge of the West. The Marquis Astolphe de Custine, the author of thesememoirs (which, it is worth mentioning, have been printed in dozens of editions inFrench, as well as in various other languages, and number hundreds of thousands ofcopies sold, in the immediate aftermath of their publication) describes, in asuccession of troubling and authentic images, Eastern despotism’s forms ofmanifestation, the absolutist character of the state and the despotic nature of theemperor, the tsar, along with the specificities of the Russian world which heencounters during the few months spent there, almost anticipating the dramatichistorical experiences which were to follow - both for Russia, and for Europe.

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