- Paperback: 320 pages
- Publisher: Profile Books; New Ed edition (6 July 2006)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1861974620
- ISBN-13: 978-1861974624
- Product Dimensions: 19.2 x 13 x 2.4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 293,800 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Review
"'Barnes writes engagingly and informedly about many fields... a remarkable achievement.' Robert Chandler, Independent 'Elegantly written... gripping narrative' Maggie Gee, New Statesman 'Barnes carries his story along in an unpretentious fashion, wearing his research lightly and never failing to intrigue... A ripping good yarn which has the merit of being entirely true.' James Harkin, Financial Times 'Delightful, fascinating, compelling... filled with swashbuckling adventurers' Simon Sebag Montefiore, Sunday Times 'A tale of tremendous ingenuity, verve and resonance' Christopher Clark, Sunday Telegraph 'Brilliant, stylish, ingenious... A small miracle of intellectual command and imaginative empathy' Peter Conrad, Observer 'Wonderfully vivid' Philip Marsden, Guardian"
Product Description
A truly amazing 18th century life restored to history - Tsar's godson and nobleman, Russian Bluebeard, engineer of genius - who began life in an African village. When Major-General Gannibal died in 1781 in his eighties, he could look back on a long and successful life. He was the godson of Peter the Great, the Empress Elizabeth had given him nobility, thousands of acres, villages of serfs. His French education and a natural gift for mathematics had led him to fame as a fireworks expert and the architect of a string of fortifications from the Arctic Circle to China. As a husband he was a provincial Bluebeard, but his descendants would include the great poet Pushkin and a bevy of British aristocrats. Yet Abram Petrovich Gannibal had been born in very different circumstances. He was a black African, perhaps from Ethiopia, perhaps from modern Chad, sold as a child into slavery. In a brilliant biography Hugh Barnes who has tracked Gannibal's footsteps across three continents restores an extraordinary life to history.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A fascinating life well told.,
By Minty Jack (UK) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Gannibal: The Moor of Petersburg (Paperback)
Even in the hands of a bad writer, the story of Gannibal would be fascinating. Fortunately Hugh Barnes writes exceptionally well. The biography of Abram Petrovic Gannibal is odd enough in it's bare outlines -an African slave spends time at the Ottoman court as a child before ending up being sent to Russia, becoming the godson of Peter the Great and eventually a successful military commander and builder of fortifications, passing through the French Army and a scandal-ridden marriage en route. However, hard facts are few and far between and interspersed in the straight history are digressions on the different uses Gannibals story has been put to and unintrusive pieces of travelogue as the author attempts to track down traces of Gannibal. It is to the author's credit that Gannibal remains at the forefront of the book and these other aspects do not drown out the subject (a weakness in other modern so-called history books where the historians travels seem more important). Underlying all attempts to get to the truth of Gannibal lies the fact he was Pushkin's great-grandfather and the Russian poet's work is littered with references to his famous ancestor and went so far as to attempt an (unfinished) novel about him. A controversial character in his own right, Pushkin's fans and detractors have all too often made judgements on Gannibal a way of firing shots in their own war. All this throws up interesting angles on slavery, serfdom, racism and the development of early modern history in general. Voltaire, Leibniz, Catherine the Great and many others crop up in his life story, shedding light in turn on all of them. In short, a wonderful, engaging, book.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Shadows of an Ancestor,
By
This review is from: Gannibal: The Moor of Petersburg (Paperback)
Gannibal is a fascinating and extraordinary character, perhaps one of the most unusual in the last five hundred years in the whole of Europe. Hugh Barnes' subject is elusive - there are very few facts about Pushkin's great-grandfather. For me this was a problem. To devote a whole book to a person about whom the facts can be resumed in a few pages is perhaps a gamble as the work has to be filled with other things. These fillers are in themselves fascinating and the reader is treated to a succession of Russian tsars (and tsarinas), to life at the French court in the early part of the 18th Century, to the Baltic states, to Constantinople and to far-flung outposts of the Russian empire...
The things that stand out at the end of the book are the founding of Petersburg and the astonishing character of Tsar Peter the Great. The actual subject of the book, Gannibal, remains shrouded in mystery. Each time that one feels one might be getting a bit closer to him, he again slides into the shadows of legend, mystery and fairy tale. Do not read this book expecting to find out much about Gannibal : but as a record of his times, it is unbeatable and very well written.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
3.0 out of 5 stars (4 customer reviews) 18 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
A huge disapointment,
By H. Marshall "H. Marshall" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Gannibal: The Moor of Petersburg (Hardcover)
This book is a poor example of a biography. But the worst parts of the book is the lack of detail (there hardly are any!!) and the author's personal travels. All the details included in the book could be summed up in four pages or a time-line.
I agree it looks good on the outside, but by reading the whole thing one only sees snippets of a life, by no means a complete one. The really sad thing with this book is that there are so many 'snippets' of Gannibal. We see again and again lines from existent letters, but only that. And those that we do see are dropped so carelessly as to be meaningless and out of the time-frame. Were these pieces all put together in a proper way, an interesting, informative biography could have been written. Rather than that we get page after page of gossip and quotes from Pushkin, who was only marginally closer to the truth than we are today. Even the book's images are poorly done; the cover picture is not even Gannibal, but some `Negre au turban' by Delacroix. In the text the author describes at least four images of Gannibal (one by Adrian Schoenbeck, one by Pierre Denis Martin, one anonymous in the Hermitage, and three sketches in a notebook by Watteau in the Louvre). Yet none of these are included in the book. Instead of these we are treated to two paintings that are a `case of mistaken identity'. The only real examples of Gannibal we get are his seal and a page from an unpublished manuscript. This makes no sense at all, if there are images available why have they not been used. Especially when the Hermitage has been gracious enough to supply other images, surely they would have given an image of the anonymously painted `Peter the vanquisher'. Though admittedly, hard-evidence and details about Gannibal are scarce this book fulfils none of a biography's requirements to any reader, it is a truly disappointing venture. 4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Insight into a Coverup,
By Pauly - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Gannibal: The Moor of Petersburg (Hardcover)
This book is excellent. It sheds light on a person that modern Russia has been trying to conceal for generations. The fact that Gannibal was an African who made substantial contributions to Russian engineering, mathematics, and sciences runs counter to Russia's deeply ingrained racism and beliefs that dark skinned people cannot be responsible for such lofty thinking. Russia has ensured that not much information is available on the true man and his achievements.
Mr. Barnes has done painstaking research to fill in many of the gaps in Russia's, Gannibal's, and Pushkin's histories in one book. He has interviewed people in several countries and even researched the African word ("Fummo") that Gannibal had ingrained on his family seal in order to figure out his actual roots. It is enlightening, revealing, and teaches us many things about history, cross-cultural exchanges and contributions, and the challenges faced by by Africans in a land where they were not (and still aren't) appreciated. Those who cannot accept Gannibal's identity and those who will overtly try to maintain the secret and deny truth will probably not appreciate the revelations made by Mr. Barnes. We have seen this type of behavior prevalent throughout the histories of Europe, Russia, and North American Countries. Those who seek truth will appreciate his efforts. Anyone interested in Russian and/or African history, or race relations should read this book.
4.0 out of 5 stars
Shadows of an ancestor,
By Anthony Peter Swallow - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Gannibal: The Moor of Petersburg (Hardcover)
Gannibal is a fascinating and extraordinary character, perhaps one of the most unusual in the last five hundred years in the whole of Europe.
Hugh Barnes' subject is elusive - there are very few facts about Pushkin's great-grandfather. For me this was a problem. To devote a whole book to a person about whom the facts can be resumed in a few pages is perhaps a gamble as the work has to be filled with other things. These fillers are in themselves fascinating and the reader is treated to a succession of Russian tsars and tsarinas, to life at the French court in the early part of the 18th Century, to the Baltic states, to Constantinople and to far-flung outposts of the Russian empire... The things that stand out at the end of the book are the founding of Petersburg and the astonishing character of Tsar Peter the Great. The actual subject of the book, Gannibal, remains shrouded in mystery. Each time that one feels one might be getting a bit closer to him, he again slides into the shadows of legend, mystery and fairy tale. Do not read this book expecting to find out much about Gannibal : but as a record of his times, it is unbeatable and very well written. |
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