Leo Tolstoy Book Review

[Liora Putcha]

Ibegan reading War and Peace (1869) by Leo Tolstoy back in April after watching and reviewing a recent 6-part BBC miniseries (2016) based on the book. I finished about forty percent of the novel and then stopped reading it in early summer. Then a couple weeks ago I decided I needed to finish it before the year was out. Every year I read one literary classic, and I had promised myself that War and Peace was going to be my 2020 read. War and Peace is currently #7 on The Greatest Books list. It did make an excellent companion to 2020, and illuminated the present with the past.

On the other hand, I was always anxious to get back to the story, and I always wanted to know more about the characters, of which there were too many to chronicle here. Pierre was my favorite, but then he is much like Levin from Anna Karenina, my favorite character in that novel. In both cases, I wondered if those characters were stand ins for Tolstoy himself?

I did that for my review of Anna Karenina. There are Bible sites that do it for many translations of the Bible, and other sites for Homer translations. Such comparisons show a wide variety of approaches and outcomes.

One more addendum. With regard to side by side comparisons of translations, here is a site where Ms. Lucy Fuggles compares two different translations. I agree with her assessment, that the Briggs translation is superior.

Like the aforementioned two books, I took this one (in Russian) from mygrandparents. The book was printed in 1945 but is in a good shape, and featuressome drawings of scenes. This is great, since from time to time you canvisualize the situation and see how the characters look like.

"Resurrection" tells the story of Nekhlyudov, a wealthy aristocrat (like mostRussian aristocrats, his wealth is inherited), in his quest to fix the evil hedid to Katyusha (a young girl whom he seduced in the past, and who became aprostitute as a result of that), and understand all the rights and wrongs oflife.

The book is very political in nature, with Tolstoy explicitly criticizes theform of goverment and economics in late 19th century Russia. It is almostpreaching to socialism, as Tolstoy presents all the evils coming from richcapitalists, who use "the people" for their own good, while most of thepopulation starves and lives in poverty.

Through Nekhlyudov, Tolstoy finds faluts not only in the economics, but also inthe minds of people. He again criticizes (even more acutely than in AnnaKarenina) the style of life of Russian aristocrats - the fake importance theyassign to their roles in society. Tolstoy puts his views in print brilliantly,sometimes through a character description, sometimes through the thoughts ofNekhlyudov.

There are also elements from War and Peace in this book. Tolstoy tries, andsucceeds, through showing the thoughts of various people, to explain how greatthings become by chance, by a plethora of small, independent circumstances, andhave nothing to do with the "Grand theme" like most people would like tobelieve. For instance, in the trial scene, one of the judges thinks about thefight with his wife, another of his mistress, many of the jury also think ofunrelated things and the advocate only cares about showing how smart he is andhow fluently he speaks. This all brings to a false conviction of Katyusha,because no one really cared.

I wish I'd write a review of this book in stages, as I made progress in it. Igot deeply impressed by it, and I fear I can't express it in a single shortreview... I should change my tactic in future reviews of great books :-)

As a matter of fact, up until 80% of the book I was sure it's one of the bestbooks I've read, and the best of Tolstoy. But then, somehow the pace sloweddown, the writing became more philosophic, and IMHO the last part of the book,where Nekhlyudov finds his "answer" in religion is the worst of all. It'snatural that I feel this way, given my thoughts on religion. Basically I don'tagree that believing in god will make me grasp this world as a better place, and"ignore" the evils people do to each other. Sadly, although I find this bookfantastic, I have to disagree with the conclusions Tolstoy reaches.

It's funny to note that in a short review that comes in the end of the book (bysome Russian author, about 40 page review of the book, written when it waspublished) there's an agreement with my thoughts. The review was written inRussia's communistic/socialistic era, so the writer strongly supports Tolstoy'santi-capitalistic views (citing Lenin), and attacks Tolstoy's "ressurection" toreligion (communists opposed religion). While I don't agree with all theanti-capitalistic views, (I think that the capitalism was incomplete or wronglybuilt there, there indeed can be better capitalism), the communist reviewer wasin full conformance with my view on Tolstoy's conclusion.

And to deprive his wife and children of the royalties of his books in favour of charities. It left me perplexed as it was his wife who transcribed his undecipherable handwriting of his early masterpieces.

Thanks again for your most meritorious masterwork as re description of such literary wonders. Liking this type of author or not is of course a completely subjective matter (duh!) but I have to agree with you that at least the colour is discriminating. I'm not all that hot about turquoises in general (who cares?) but a washed out, creamy one at that is maybe even comparable to the smell (with which I am not familiar). What does it smell like? Phenol would be nice (at least for me). Too bad the other physical properties here which you also disdain -- or, may I say loathe? -- seem to substantiate everything else about this fluid. Well, there are other inks in this department which boast more positive traits....

To augment our compilation of perversities here, it's weird (or was it wonderful?) that this ink -- at least its name -- was used 15 years ago by Nathan to depict a washed out, creamy coral-orange tone.

Liking this type of author or not is of course a completely subjective matter (duh!) but I have to agree with you that at least the colour is discriminating. I'm not all that hot about turquoises in general (who cares?) but a washed out, creamy one at that is maybe even comparable to the smell (with which I am not familiar).

Think an industrial strength cleanser. The moment I open the vial the scent over powers my nostrils, like smelling concentrated bleach, mixed with gasoline The effect to my sense of smell, is like an arrow in the nostril. It even gave me a mild momentary headache

Too bad the other physical properties here which you also disdain -- or, may I say loathe? -- seem to substantiate everything else about this fluid. Well, there are other inks in this department which boast more positive traits....

@yazeh -- Thanks as usual for the review. I suspect that this one is going to be a bit too light a color for me to use on a regular basis. As for the author? I liked the translation of War and Peace that was done in IIRC the 1950s by some Englishwoman (it was the Penguin edition) -- of course it also helped that I had previously seen the 4 hour train wreck of a movie on TV first, which basically was the "Cliffnotes" version (Henry Fonda was COMPLETELY miscast, IME, as Pierre, when I then read the novel). But if I NEVER have to read Anna Karenina again? It will be too soon....

Thank you @yazeh for taking the effort, for accepting the challenge, for passing through the headache time, for giving Tolstoy a second chance and finally, for taking one more photo under UV-light. That's a lot for a disliked ink! I'm impressed by your toughness and by your resistances!

of course it also helped that I had previously seen the 4 hour train wreck of a movie on TV first, which basically was the "Cliffnotes" version (Henry Fonda was COMPLETELY miscast, IME, as Pierre, when I then read the novel). But if I NEVER have to read Anna Karenina again? It will be too soon....

It's the worse thing when you lose interest in characters and wish that someone will put them out of miseries. I often times see in new movies churning out of streaming platforms. You wish the worse for all characters, before stopping the show midway

This book is about Anna I. Harris and Luca Kroft. Student and professor, respectively. After fleeing from an awkward blind date of mistaken identity (and the only man who looks good in leather pants), Anna forgets and moves on. That is until she walks into her Russian Lit class only to discover the ridiculously hot blind date is her professor. And suddenly the summer course looks a lot harder than she thought it'd be.

I have to admit, I was a bit nervous about this book since it is dealing with a student/professor relationship. I get a little apprehensive about books where there is such an imbalance in power dynamic. However, I think Kissing Tolstoy did a fairly good job addressing that issue. It didn't make me want to scream at Luca that he's risking his career by pursuing Anna.

Anna and Luca are a fun new addition to the Reid Universe. They challenge each other, make each other laugh, and both are nerds for Russian lit. It was filled with witty one-liners that I've come to expect from Reid. No matter if Reid gives her readers a short story or a full-length book, she is able to spin wonderful stories that have me yearning for more. Kissing Tolstoy is no exception.

Yes, I felt shabby and small, but that's okay. I was shabby and small. There's nothing wrong with being shabby and small. Hobbits are shabby and small and look how badass they are. Plus, second breakfast for the win.

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