For an accurate, quick, synoptic as well as visual history of Russia, there could not have been a better book than Ian Barnes’s Historical Atlas of Russia. Barnes explains the diversity and complexity of Russia from the origins of Russian statehood to the contemporary Russian Federation under the Putin regime with all its pluralities and enigmas. Critics might question such a work for being unable to do justice to such a long period. But Barnes has been able to synthesize this by developing four themes that run through the book in historical time. He explains these with relevant maps and texts and occasional photographs that define Russia from its earliest period to the current map of the country.
October 2015, volume 39, No 10