Orlando Figes was born to a feminist writer; Eva Figes, in London on 20th of November 1959. His elder sister was a writer, author and editor. During his early years Figes went to William Ellis School, where he studied for seven years, from 1971 to 1978. In 1979 he joined the Gonville and Caius College, which is under the University of Cambridge, to study history. In the year 1982 he graduated from this college winning the prestigious “double starred first” award. The next 15 years he spent in the Trinity College, which is also under the University of Cambridge as a fellow and from here he attained his PhD degree. During this period, Figes worked as a lecturer of history in the same university for almost 12 years prior to joining the Birkbeck College, which is under the London University as the Chair of History.
Over the years Orlando Figes has written several books and he is widely recognized for his writings, which mainly focus on the Russian History. His renowned book “A People’s Tragedy” was released in 1996 while “Natasha’s Dance” was released in 2002 and his “The Whisperers” was published in 2007. The secret behind the huge success of his books is that Figes incorporated different forms of methodologies in his writing, such as the cultural, social and oral historical facts. Besides that, he learned as well as mastered the technique of blending two different writing styles that is the academic and literary writing techniques.
The main subject matter of the book “A People’s Tragedy” written by Orlando Figes focuses on the Russian Revolution. In this particular book he linked all the social and political historical factors in a proper sequence together with the complete biography, by means of a chronological method of narrating. This innovative and unique writing style helped Figes’ works receive numerous awards. His book “A People’s Tragedy” received enormous popularity and was regarded as extremely crucial to historical study. Owing to this reason the book has been later translated in over 20 different languages. His latest book “Crimea: The Last Crusade” was published in 2010.
Over the years the books of Orlando Figes has been translated into many important languages, such as Portuguese, French, German, Italian, Dutch, Spanish, and so on. Figes also reveals his zeal for writing for the global media scene. In addition to that, he at times takes part in radio and TV talks. He has also been invited by the New York Review of Books to assess various un-reviewed books. Apart from this, he is an active member of the association called “Royal Society of Literature”.