Hannah

“It is one of the supreme ironies of history that the blessed birth of an only son should have proved the mortal blow. Even as the saluting cannons boomed and the flags waved, Fate had prepared a terrible story. Along with the lost battles and sunken ships, the bombs, the revolutionaries and their plots, the strikes and revolts, Imperial Russia was toppled by a tiny defect in the body of a little boy.”
― Robert K. Massie, Nicholas and Alexandra: The Classic Account of the Fall of the Romanov Dynasty

“The German leaders, said Winston Churchill, turned upon Russia the most grisly of all weapons. They transported Lenin in a sealed truck like a plague bacillus from Switzerland into Russia.”
― Robert K. Massie, Nicholas and Alexandra: The Classic Account of the Fall of the Romanov Dynasty

“Naomi noted in closing that Britain had one of the "most staunchly conservation-oriented publics ... they are strongly antiwhaling ... they are an island nation who feel they must protect the marine environment." Yet there were zero cetacean displays left in the UK. "Clearly they are getting their marine education, their marine ethic, from some other source.”
― David Kirby, Death at SeaWorld: Shamu and the Dark Side of Killer Whales in Captivity

“There would be no Lenin without Rasputin.”
― Robert Massie