NEWSHOUR BOOKSHELF - "Stalin's Daughter"

"You think you know the story of Stalin until you read about the extraordinary life of his daughter Svetlana" PBS NewsHour 6/15/2015

Excerpt

SUMMARY:  She was born into a life of privilege amidst terror -- her father the dictator of the Soviet Union.  Her story is told in the new biography "Stalin's Daughter:  The Extraordinary and Tumultuous Life of Svetlana Alliluyeva" by Rosemary Sullivan.  Judy Woodruff talked with Sullivan, and Svetlana's American daughter Chris Evans.

HARI SREENIVASAN (NewsHour):  Now, the latest addition to the “NewsHour Bookshelf.”

She was born into a life of privilege amidst terror.  Her father was distant, and, one by one, those closest to her vanished, until she herself defected leaving part of her family behind in the Soviet Union.

Her story is told in the new biography “Stalin’s Daughter:  The Extraordinary and Tumultuous Life of Svetlana Alliluyeva” by Rosemary Sullivan.

Recently, Judy Woodruff talked with her and Svetlana’s American daughter, Chrese Evans.

JUDY WOODRUFF (NewsHour):  Rosemary Sullivan, Chrese Evans, thank you very much for joining us.

CHRESE EVANS, Daughter of Svetlana Alliluyeva:  Thank you.

ROSEMARY SULLIVAN, Author, “Stalin’s Daughter:  The Extraordinary and Tumultuous Life of Svetlana Alliluyeva”:  Pleasure to be here.

JUDY WOODRUFF:  Rosemary Sullivan, there is a lot of new material in here.  You were able to get access to politburo notes, CIA files.  What do you think you ultimately were able to add to her story?

ROSEMARY SULLIVAN:  I don’t think anybody has been able to speak to the number of people I spoke to.

I was able to interview 40 different people in Russia, in Georgia, in London, in the United States.  I was able to get the FBI files, the CIA files, the (INAUDIBLE) files, some documents when I went to Russia in the state archives.

So, it was precisely the right moment to write the book, because all of that material could be brought together in a way that I don’t think has been known before.  And Svetlana’s story is so different from her father’s story.  You think you know Stalin, and then you find his daughter, this woman of principle, of intelligence, of humanitarian impulses.