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Updated: June 29, 2025
The vast prospects, the far-reaching perspectives of 'War and Peace' made it as great a surprise for me in the historical novel as 'Anna Karenina' had been in the study of contemporary life; and its people and interests did not seem more remote, since they are of a civilization always as strange and of a humanity always as known.
Perhaps I'd better mention only the very greatest, like Don Quixote, and Gil Blas, and Wilhelm Meister, and The Vicar of Wakefield, and Clarissa Harlowe, and Emma, and Pride and Prejudice, and The Bride of Lammermoor, and I Promessi Sposi, and Belinda, and Frankenstein, and Chartreuse de Parme, and César Birotteau, and The Last Days of Pompeii, and David Copperfield, and Pendennis, and The Scarlet Letter, and Blithedale Romance, and The Cloister and the Hearth, and Middlemarch, and Smoke, and Fathers and Sons, and A Nest of Nobles, and War and Peace, and Anna Karénina, and Resurrection, and Dona Perfecta, and Marta y Maria, and I Malavoglia, and The Return of the Native, and L'Assomoir, and Madame Bovary, and The Awkward Age, and The Grandissimes and most of the other books of the same authors.
On the 19 March 1873, he began the composition of "Anna Karenina," which was to give him his greatest fame outside of Russia. Several years were spent in its composition and publication. Despite the power of genius displayed in this masterpiece, he did not enjoy writing it, and seemed to be unaware of its splendid qualities.
It was published in the "Russian Messenger," and the separate numbers drew the attention of critics everywhere, not merely in Russia, but all over Europe. The printing began in 1874. All went well enough for two years, as we see by a letter of the Countess Tolstoi, in December 1876. "At last we are writing "Anna Karenina comme il faut," that is, without interruptions.
"As soon as I remembered that, she went where I wanted her to, and did everything she had to. You would think a bonnet is a small affair, but everything depended on that bonnet." As I recall this conversation, I feel sure that my father was talking about that scene in "Anna Karenina" where ANNA went to see her son.
Vronsky heard the name of Madame Karenina, and noticed how the colonel hastened to address Vronsky loudly by name, with a meaning glance at his companions. "Ah, Vronsky! When are you coming to the regiment? We can't let you off without a supper. You're one of the old set," said the colonel of his regiment.
He had the strength of a Hercules, but he was a far better non-resistant than Tolstoy, because he took his medicine with a wink, while Fate is obliged to hold the nose of the author of "Anna Karenina," who never sees the comedy of an inward struggle and an outward compliance, any more than does the benedict, safely entrenched under the bed, who shouts out, "I defy thee, I defy thee!" as did Mephisto when Goethe thrust him into Tophet.
In 1875 he wrote, "For two months I have not soiled my fingers with ink, but now I return again to this tiresome and vulgar "Anna Karenina," with the sole wish of getting it done as soon as possible, in order that I may have time for other work."
And if on the stage they are a thousand times more interesting to see than "Anna Karenina" is to read, they must indeed be thrilling. It is, however, perfectly true that a foreigner cannot judge the real value of Russian plays by reading them. We ought to hear them performed by a Russian company.
The fateful hour will arrive when we shall be sick of Ponderevos. The temptation of the great novelist, overflowing with creative force, is to scatter the interest. In both his major works Tolstoi found the temptation too strong for him. Anna Karenina is not one novel, but two, and suffers accordingly.
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