The weakness of a well-intentioned Tsar provide the basis for an engrossing character study as well as a key to the failure of his attempts to bring about peaceful political evolution in Russia. Alexander II is credited with "modernizing" Russia-he liberated the millions of serfs and inaugurated sweeping internal reforms. But his personal failings, combined with the social and political ferment resulting from his relaxation of absolute rule, led to his assassination; its aftermath set Russia squarely on the road to revolution. W.E. Mosse, British historian and an authority on nineteenth-century Russia, brings into focus the roles played by Alexander's friends and enemies, his family and his mistress, as he delineates the course of the Tsars's personal tragedy and of his influence on the processes of historical change in Russia.

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