“Life is also meaningful without being married’, she had once told her mother, and marrying merely for the sake of it was, in her view, ‘one of the greatest mistakes a woman can make”
―
Helen Rappaport,
The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“History may have condemned him many times over for being a weak and reactionary tsar, but he was, without doubt, the most exemplary of royal fathers.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Father asks me to tell all who have remained loyal to him and those over who they might have influence, that they should not advenge him, for he has forgiven everyone and prays for them all; that they should not themselves seek revenge; that they should remember that the evil there is now is in the world will become yet more powerful, and that it is not evil that will conquer evil – only love.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Show kindness to all, be gentle and loving, then all will love you” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Happy voices, smiling faces, golden memories of a summer afternoon, of a world that could still laugh and talk of war as something far away.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“I cannot bear to think what will become of me without you – you who are my one and all, who make up all my life” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Many years later he insisted, ‘They knew it was the end when I was with them’; that evening, though the words remained resolutely unspoken, everyone had a clear sense of what might lie ahead.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“I cannot bear to think what will become of me without you – you who are my one and all, who make up all my life’,” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“After all, in this life we do not know what lies before us.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Having benefited from happy days, should I not share with them the bad days?” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“It’s hard thinking about where they are taking us. While you’re on the way there you think less of what lies ahead, but your heart is heavy when you start to think about how far you are from your family and if and when you might see them again. I haven’t seen my sister once in five months.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“St Petersburg society looked upon Grand Duchess Vladimir as the real Empress of Russia, for Alexandra now hardly ever emerged from her retirement at Tsarskoe Selo.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“For her, and for other loyal retainers and friends left behind, the memory of those four lovely sisters in happier times, of their many kindnesses, of their shared joys and sorrows – the ‘laughing faces under the brims of their big flower-trimmed hats’ – would continue to linger during the long, deadening years of communism.22 As, too, would the memory of their vivacious brother who daily challenged his life-threatening disability and refused to be cowed by it. And always, hovering in the background, a woman whose abiding virtue – and one that, perversely, destroyed them all in the end – was a fatal excess of mother love.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“crammed from floor to ceiling with religious images, crucifixes and ‘pathetic, cheap little tin ikons’.8 On every shelf and table top in her private sitting room the tsaritsa had set out yet more knick-knacks and photographs of her children and her darling Nicky. Personal possessions were few and surprisingly trivial – useful domestic items such as a gold thimble, sewing materials and embroidery scissors, as well as cheap toys and trinkets – ‘a china bird and a pincushion” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“I now have to choose between son and husband. But I have made my decision and I have to be strong. I must leave my boy and share my life – or my death – with my husband.17” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“It was clear to anyone who encountered the tsar and his daughters in the Alexander Park how much pride he had in his girls. ‘He was happy that people admired them. It was as though his kind blue eyes were saying to them: “Look what wonderful daughters I have.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“She ought to try eating raw ham in bed in the morning before breakfast. It really does help against nausea ” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“for the youngest Romanov daughter was a force of nature to whose presence it was impossible to remain indifferent. Even” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“The wish to capture evanescent reflections, is not only impossible, as has been shown by thorough German Investigation, but the mere desire alone, the will to do so, is blasphemy. God created man in His own image, and no man-made machine may fix the image of God. Is it possible that God should have abandoned His eternal principles, and allowed a Frenchman in Paris to give to the world an invention of the Devil” ― Helen Rappaport, Capturing the Light: The Birth of Photography, a True Story of Genius and Rivalry
“History may have condemned him many times over for being a weak and reactionary tsar, but he was, without doubt, the most exemplary of royal fathers.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Father asks me to tell all who have remained loyal to him and those over who they might have influence, that they should not advenge him, for he has forgiven everyone and prays for them all; that they should not themselves seek revenge; that they should remember that the evil there is now is in the world will become yet more powerful, and that it is not evil that will conquer evil – only love.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Show kindness to all, be gentle and loving, then all will love you” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Happy voices, smiling faces, golden memories of a summer afternoon, of a world that could still laugh and talk of war as something far away.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“I cannot bear to think what will become of me without you – you who are my one and all, who make up all my life” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Many years later he insisted, ‘They knew it was the end when I was with them’; that evening, though the words remained resolutely unspoken, everyone had a clear sense of what might lie ahead.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“I cannot bear to think what will become of me without you – you who are my one and all, who make up all my life’,” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“After all, in this life we do not know what lies before us.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“Having benefited from happy days, should I not share with them the bad days?” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“It’s hard thinking about where they are taking us. While you’re on the way there you think less of what lies ahead, but your heart is heavy when you start to think about how far you are from your family and if and when you might see them again. I haven’t seen my sister once in five months.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“St Petersburg society looked upon Grand Duchess Vladimir as the real Empress of Russia, for Alexandra now hardly ever emerged from her retirement at Tsarskoe Selo.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“For her, and for other loyal retainers and friends left behind, the memory of those four lovely sisters in happier times, of their many kindnesses, of their shared joys and sorrows – the ‘laughing faces under the brims of their big flower-trimmed hats’ – would continue to linger during the long, deadening years of communism.22 As, too, would the memory of their vivacious brother who daily challenged his life-threatening disability and refused to be cowed by it. And always, hovering in the background, a woman whose abiding virtue – and one that, perversely, destroyed them all in the end – was a fatal excess of mother love.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“crammed from floor to ceiling with religious images, crucifixes and ‘pathetic, cheap little tin ikons’.8 On every shelf and table top in her private sitting room the tsaritsa had set out yet more knick-knacks and photographs of her children and her darling Nicky. Personal possessions were few and surprisingly trivial – useful domestic items such as a gold thimble, sewing materials and embroidery scissors, as well as cheap toys and trinkets – ‘a china bird and a pincushion” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“I now have to choose between son and husband. But I have made my decision and I have to be strong. I must leave my boy and share my life – or my death – with my husband.17” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“It was clear to anyone who encountered the tsar and his daughters in the Alexander Park how much pride he had in his girls. ‘He was happy that people admired them. It was as though his kind blue eyes were saying to them: “Look what wonderful daughters I have.” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“She ought to try eating raw ham in bed in the morning before breakfast. It really does help against nausea ” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“for the youngest Romanov daughter was a force of nature to whose presence it was impossible to remain indifferent. Even” ― Helen Rappaport, The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra
“The wish to capture evanescent reflections, is not only impossible, as has been shown by thorough German Investigation, but the mere desire alone, the will to do so, is blasphemy. God created man in His own image, and no man-made machine may fix the image of God. Is it possible that God should have abandoned His eternal principles, and allowed a Frenchman in Paris to give to the world an invention of the Devil” ― Helen Rappaport, Capturing the Light: The Birth of Photography, a True Story of Genius and Rivalry
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