The Pages of My Life. Memoirs of the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna's Friend

Anna Alexandrovna Vyrubova (née Taneeva) was a close person to the royal family, a friend of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, and one of the few who did not renounce the Romanovs in 1917. She held the court position of lady-in-waiting for a short time, only until her short and unsuccessful marriage, and then remained simply a friend of the imperial family.

Empress Alexandra Feodorovna found it difficult to get close to people, and those who were close to her faced envy and gossip from the court circle.

This fate also befell Anna Vyrubova. The gossip mongers especially tried to embellish her acquaintance with Rasputin, which occurred thanks to the empress, with vivid and wild details. Anna Vyrubova was subjected to wild persecutions, mockery, denunciations, and imprisonment immediately after the abdication of Nicholas II, but she endured everything without betraying the royal family, to which she was sincerely attached. Only in her somewhat naive and candid memoirs did she attempt to reveal the truth. 

The first editions of A.A. Vyrubova's memoirs were accompanied by the publication of letters to her from members of the royal family (Paris, 1922) and letters from Anna herself from prison to her parents and acquaintances in the post-revolutionary period (Berlin, 1923). These letters, being of great historical interest, are included in the appendix to this edition.