“The Memoirs of Count Witte”, by Sergei Yulyevich Witte, translated and edited by Sidney Harcave

 

920 pages, Taylor & Francis, ISBN-13: 978-0873325714

The Memoirs of Count Witte are the diaries of one Count Sergei Yulyevich Witte, the little-known and controversial minister who served under the last two emperors of Russia, Alexander III (reigned 1881 to 1894) and his son Nicholas II (reigned 1894 to 1917). This translation by Sidney Harcave was based on the original texts of his memoirs which are held at the Bakhmeteff Archive of Russian and East European Culture of Columbia University. A huge, ungainly man – both physically and mentally, I would argue – Witte was a tireless worker in service to his Tsars and his nation, being at the best of times plain-spoken and, at the not-so-best-of times, coarse, he managed to evoke and provoke extreme characterizations in friends and enemies alike, ranging from “Russia’s John the Baptist” (according to Josef Melnik) to “Russia’s Evil Genius” (in the words of Aleksandr Mikhailovich Bezobrazov and Vladimir Mikhailovich Vonliarliarskii, amongst others). Everyone agreed that he was remarkably able, but whether or not he deserved to be compared to Jean-Baptiste Colbert (maybe), Peter the Great (doubtful) or Otto von Bismarck (closer), the jury is still out, but there can be no question that Witte was the ablest minister of the twilight years of Russian tsarism.

As for his character, there is even less agreement: many people, both high and low, saw him as a nefarious character, a power-hungry man who conspired with Jews and revolutionaries (both groups often used in the same breath) for his own purposes. There were also many people, again both high and low, who saw in him a devoted subject who, alone among the emperor’s ministers, had the ability to cope with Russia’s problems and to do so honestly, to boot, without the desire or need to fill his own pockets or indulge his own desires. The latter were closer to the mark than the former. No doubt Witte was extremely ambitious and sometimes devious, but he was devoted to Russia and the Romanov dynasty. I, for one, lean towards the Witte-as-Dude side of the argument; of all of the men who served the creaky, collapsing Russian Empire, he seemed the most honest, an assessment I have come to, not only through his memoirs, but from all of the other books I have read on Russian history (not that Nicholas II would have agreed; when Witte died in 1915, a year into the war he had the courage to speak out against for which he was branded a traitor, the last Tsar made a toast with the French ambassador in celebration). A poor way to treat the memory of this Russian Cassandra who was loyal – and ignored – until the end.