| In Memoriam-Robert K. Massie Robert K. Massie, a Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer who wrote popular books on giants of Russian history, died on Monday at his home in Irvington, N.Y. He was 90. The cause was complications of Alzheimer's disease, said his wife, the literary agent Deborah Karl. Mr. Massie said his literary odyssey was set in motion by research he did at the New York Public Library during lunch breaks from his job as a young journalist. It was purely personal research at first: He wanted to know more about the bleeding disease of hemophilia and how he and his wife at the time, could help their hemophiliac son, Bob. During his research he became fascinated with perhaps the most famous childhood case of hemophilia, that of Alexei, a son of Nicholas and Alexandra. Mr. Massie wound up writing an article on hemophilia for The Saturday Evening Post, where he had taken a job in 1962. He wrote an accompanying article about Alexei and his parents, but The Post did not print it. Still, he found himself unable to abandon the family drama of the Romanovs, as the Russian dynasty was known, and he eventually quit his job to pursue the subject full time. A decade later, "Nicholas and Alexandra" was published to acclaim. Though nearly 1,000 pages long, it sold more than 4.5 million copies and is regarded as one of the most popular historical studies ever published. photo courtesy of Karsten Moran for The New York Times Check out his titles here. |
