Rebecca Matlock

At Spaso House Rebecca Matlock

From 1933 when President Franklin Roosevelt established diplomatic relations with the USSR, the American ambassador has lived and entertained guests in a mansion located on Spasopeskovskaya ploshchadka, quite a mouthful for most Americans, so they shortened it to "Spaso House." That is the locale Rebecca Matlock chose for her account of the interactions of American and Soviet people from the 1930s to 1991. She has drawn on the memoirs of diplomats and journalists and on her experience during eleven years as a diplomat's wife in Moscow. As Spaso House hostess from 1987 to 1991, she entertained presidents, foreign ministers, diplomats of many countries, business tycoons, legislators, teachers and students, along with world-famous poets, artists and musicians. Her account of how Cold War hostility and suspicion yielded to understanding and growing cooperation contains important lessons for us today