Alexander M. Martin grew up in Germany, Switzerland, and France, and was educated at Cornell and the University of Pennsylvania. He taught from 1993 to 2006 at Oglethorpe University in Atlanta, Georgia, and is now associate professor in European history at the University of Notre Dame.

Winner of the Marc Raeff Prize of the Eighteenth-Century Russian Studies Association for best book in the field
Winner of the Urban History Association Award for Best Book in Non-North American Urban History

"Enlightened Metropolis is well-written and meticulously researched...His chapters are rich...in detail...[T]his book adds significantly to our understanding of the history of Moscow, and in particular, how the city was imagined and portrayed by writers and other contemporary commentators."--The Russian Review

"Bringing to bear a vast variety of sources in four languages...Martin masterfully brings to life the empire's second capital as a city in constant flux and teeming with a shifting, diverse population...Martin deftly blends intellectual, social, and cultural history, drawing on his rich variety of source material in order to address scholarly literatures on a wide range of topics...[T]he book offers scholars rich detail on material culture, everyday life, urban personal narratives, the development of Russian urban ethnography, and memory and nostalgia. It should be required reading for anyone interested in the history of imperial Russia."--Ab Imperio