A genius for living

Perhaps the only drawback to this highly enjoyable biography is the shadow of utter banality that it throws over one’s own life by comparison. Princess Sofka Dolgorouky, the author’s grandmother and namesake, began life as scion of one of the great ruling families of Russia and a playmate of the Tsarevich. She was brought up by her grandmother, a figure reminiscent of the Countess in Pushkin’s The Queen of Spades who did not know how to dress herself. Her mother, meanwhile, astonished Petersburg society by becoming a surgeon, flying her own plane, and receiving not one but two Crosses of St George for her bravery as a doctor during the first world war; her father occasioned less surprise but no less scandal by marrying his gypsy mistress. Yet with hindsight Sofka’s extraordinary childhood seemed peaceful, even rather dull, cut short as it was by the Revolution. Zinovieff aptly quotes the Chinese curse, ‘May you be born in interesting times.’