3c:T54c,Rasputin’s story is a familiar one – an illiterate Siberian peasant who managed to secure the confidence of the last Tsar and Tsarina of Russia, while indulging his legendary sexual appetite and love of hard drinking. Rasputin was so revered by his acolytes that they would collect his fingernail clippings, as if they were some kind of holy relic. When his extraordinary life was brought to an equally extraordinary end when he refused to die – murdered eventually in cold blood by a group of aristocrats – it unleashed the Russian revolution, and changed the geopolitical landscape in ways that still resonate today.That’s one version of events that’s held sway for more than one hundred years. And yet so much of the Rasputin legend has been pieced together by those looking to discredit him. Is it possible to peel away the layers of myth-making and get to the heart of who Rasputin really was and what he stood for?Joining Bridget Kendall on a truth-seeking mission is Russian imperial historian Helen Rappaport, author of The Race to Save the Romanovs; Russian literary translator and executive editor of the Los Angeles Review of Books, Boris Dralyuk; and historian Douglas Smith, author of the 2016 biography Rasputin: Faith, Power and the Twilight of the Romanovs.Photo: Grigori Rasputin. (Fine Art Images/Heritage Images/Getty Images)3d:T4f4,

The legend of Rasputin's death goes that he survived poisoning, being shot in the head before being thrown through a hole in the ice in the Neva River, where he finally died by drowning. But Rasputin biographer Douglas Smith, Dan's guest today, says that isn't what happened. He's been to Russia to study the crime scene photos and the evidence and says things happened a little differently to the way the history is told...

He joins Dan to dig into the life of Grigori Rasputin, the Siberian mystique whose charisma held the Romanov Tsar and Tsarina in a vice-like grip, securing his own influence over Russia's politics and church at the turn of the 20th century.

Produced by James Hickmann and edited by Dougal Patmore

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3e:T40c,Grigori Rasputin, Russian mystic, survived multiple assassination attempts on the same night. He was poisoned, he was shot, he was drowned in a freezing St Petersburg river. His corpse was emasculated. What is myth here and what is truth? Who was the real Rasputin? Why did so many people want him dead?Our guest today is Douglas Smith, author of the acclaimed biography Rasputin: The BiographyEdited by Tomos Delargy. Produced by Sophie Gee. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe. You can take part in our listener survey here.All music from Epidemic Sounds/All3 MediaAfter Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal is a History Hit podcast.Voting is now open for the Listener's Choice Award at this year's Podcast Awards. Click to place your vote on the Spotify mobile app: https://open.spotify.com/s/xhg6PJa Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.3f:T41d,In part one, Grigori Rasputin went from a powerless peasant to the spiritual advisor of the Tsar and Tsarina, the most powerful couple in Russia. Now, Rasputin’s “healing abilities” have been put to the test. If he saves their son, Alexei, he can solidify his place of power. If he doesn’t, he’s gone for good. Unfortunately for Rasputin, whatever the outcome, he’s already made enemies who a

92. Killing Rasputin