It appears that the story for "Anna Karenina" came out of an episode in which Leo Tolstoy arrived at a railway station shortly after a young woman had committed suicide. She had been the mistress of a neighboring landowner, and the incident stuck in his mind...
As Tolstoy biographer writes, "A dreadful lesson was brought home to him... He tried to imagine the existence of this poor woman who had given all for love, only to meet with such a trite, ugly death."
A couple of years later “Anna Karenina” came to life.
“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
And thereby rolls out the colourful life of Anna, the most beautiful and charming of women, caught in a loveless marriage, finds herself swept off her feet by the dashing and playful Count Vronsky. Her yearning for happiness only brings more tragedy upon her as she is cast aside from the society and separated from her own son.
In the meantime ‘Kitty’, who was first led on by Vronsky but later ignored with the arrival of Anna, finds love in a very different “Levin” whose struggle for life, for labour, and the understanding of life and death brings another dimension of life to the story.
Tolstoy has masterfully interwoven these two stories without confusing or boring the reader, and has left any judgement (if any is needed) for the reader.
This is truly a masterpiece! It’s beautifully written! I haven’t read Tolstoy before and now I know why he’s regarded as a Great in the literary world.
The only thing that irritated me was the aristocratic life style (which of course has nothing to do with Tolstoy, for it’s the way the Russian societal structure works!). Maybe he was trying to portray its absurdity through the character of the down-to earth Levin.
It’s not at all possible to sum up the book in a few paragraphs, for the book itself was 850+ pages! But to put it in two words, an “Epic Masterpiece”.
3 comments:
Really?? Great, I have the book but haven't read it yet... Will do so with your great review! :) I have watched the movie, and bought the book to give it a chance (you know my discomfort with Russian authors right? ;-))
On another note Sas, have you read "The Remains of the Day"... Try and read it if you can, I think you'll enjoy it immensely! :)
yeah I understand your discomfort, the good thing about this one is there are only a handful of characters, so you don't have a list of long names and nicknames to remember :)
But there are some very philosophical discussions here and there.....which was a bit of a discomfort for me.
And no I haven't read "The remains of the day", will add that to my list :) thanks
I liked the story but didnt like the end...(Anna's death) I felt it was too much of a punishment for her mistakes in life.
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