The Battle of the Iron Chancellors

A premiere. A novel from the history of Russian diplomacy.
“I offer a strictly political novel. Without adornment. Without fiction. Without lyricism. A novel from the history of Russian diplomacy. Telling about the past is tempting, but it is not easy…”—wrote at the end of the 20th century, in the preface to his novel—the bestselling writer Valentin Pikulin.

The novel presents the most important events of foreign and domestic policy of Russia in the 19th century.
Humanity is such that it knows how to forget a great deal. The task of history, on the contrary, is to remember! Prince Gorchakov, the Illustrious, is not wronged by the attention of posterity. Historians of diplomacy delve into his far-sighted plans—he was a major politician of the century. Literary historians carefully examine his old-fashioned figure—on which the sunlit glints of Russian poetry fell: he began his life as a friend of Pushkin and ended it as a friend of Tyutchev.