Jump to content

Tolstoy


Freewheeling Andy

Recommended Posts

We don't seem to have a Tolstoy thread. I'm making my second attempt at War and Peace, and after battling through a seriously turgid opening 50 pages where I was really struggling to understand who was who, and what they were doing, it's beginning to pick up in the second 50 pages. The interaction of the characters is finally coming to life for me. And I'm quite excited to know that a few pages away the war scenes will start, which my mum tells me are some of the best things in literature.

 

I notice a few people have Anna Karenina (which I've never even opened) on their TBR piles so perhaps it's time to discuss Tolstoy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good idea, Andy!

 

I notice a few people have Anna Karenina (which I've never even opened) on their TBR piles so perhaps it's time to discuss Tolstoy.

 

Yep, I'm one of those people. I'm not sure when I'll get around to reading it, but maybe this thread will help :D

 

I feel re-inspired to read it again after seeing Newsnight Review last Friday: they were discussing those new (awful) abridged classics, and Anna Karenina was one of them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So is it the same as War and Peace? Not only incredibly long, but it takes an age to really get going at all, and there's a cast that's almost incomprehensibly large to start off with?

 

I think so! Especially confusing as Anna isn't the only principal character, despite being in the title...

 

The translation I've got is wonderfully fluent tho' so I imagine that will help :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The translation is an interesting thing, too. I know that Tolstoy wrote parts of War and Peace in French and parts in Russian. In the translation it mentions the characters talking in French as part of the text because it's relevent to whethern they're being posh or coarse in the society.

 

And yet when there's a German speaking officer talking Russian, the translater puts it into a sort of cod-German accent "Zis iz ze vey ve do sings" etc.

 

I'm sure it's necessary but it seems a little clumsy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

They do that with the Dostoevsky translations as well (well the ones I have read). I really like it TBH. I mean it gives a clear indication of how the German minorities would've been thought of.

 

But anyway I would like to read War and Peace.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, I've been checking and it seems that it's large chunks of dialogue that are in French - the "narration" is all in Russian. But in 1805 Russia the upper classes did tend to speak a lot of French so it's basically reflecting reality.

 

What's interesting is that it gets specifically stated in my translation:

 

Prince Andrey stepped forward and spoke quietly to him in French. "Sir, you asked me to remind you about Dolokhov..."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Actually I've had both War and Peace and Anna Karenina in my TBR stack, and this morning pulled AK further up in the stack....maybe by next month, or June....I hope.:D Although who knows what book will distract me in the mean time. :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...

I've finished War & Peace now. I'm not sure it makes sense to do a "review", as the book has surely been reviewed more times than it needs to have been.

 

Anyway, my thoughts are that as a historical family romance romp kind of thing, it was fantastic. As a description of wars and battle scenes, it was also fantastic. It may be one of the best novels ever written. But it is deeply, deeply flawed.

 

There are too many pages discussing the flow of history, discussing how events happen without the control of people. The whole of Epilogue 2 is redundant and incredibly dull, too, being full of only this stuff.

 

Tolstoy needs to discuss his views on history a bit, as he tries to explain how the war of 1812 flowed, how the French won almost every battle yet lost the war, how the inaction of the Russians led to the greatest success. He wants to explain how "Great Men" don't change wars and history, that the flow of human history will happen irrespective of Great Men. A view with which I strongly differ.

 

But Tolstoy appears to be trying to contrast that with the love and happinness you can make in your own life, and to those closest to you. He's talking about the contrast between how you achieve personal redemption, and why that is what you should focus on rather than focussing on the bigger stage where neither you nor anyone else will genuinely change anything.

 

So the discussions on the nature of history are clearly relevent to the book, but they are just too long winded (and, to my mind, wrong).

 

The other thing that drags, for me, is a typical tendency in Victorian novels for the characters to spend too long on introspection, and have moments of epiphane when they suddenly change their entire outlook on life; to me neither of these things seems particularly realistic, although perhaps that's because of my modern sensitivities.

 

But, these criticisms aside, it's still a wonderful book once you battle past the swarms of characters and determine who is who. Something that's pretty inevitable in a 1400 page novel.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

The War and Peace is still on The Pile (one of them, anyways), but I have read Anna Karenina. Albeit it was many years ago (in high school) I do remember it rather well as we dealt with it for a long time. It's not that confusing with the names and such, as in the end there aren't many central characters. It's a beautiful story, and a very realistic description of its time (common to all the DRD's, Dead Russian Dudes as we called them in high school, really). If any of you wish to discuss Anna Karenina in more detail, I'd be happy to join in.

 

Oh, one word of warning, though. At least for me it was very hard to like Anna. I though she was a real cow, if you don't mind me saying so. The true art of the story is, thus, that everything makes sense. You find yourself agreeing with the characters and their actions, even if you don't like them one bit. It just makes sense.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've finished War & Peace now. I'm not sure it makes sense to do a "review", as the book has surely been reviewed more times than it needs to have been.

 

Anyway, my thoughts are that as a historical family romance romp kind of thing, it was fantastic. As a description of wars and battle scenes, it was also fantastic. It may be one of the best novels ever written. But it is deeply, deeply flawed.

 

There are too many pages discussing the flow of history, discussing how events happen without the control of people. The whole of Epilogue 2 is redundant and incredibly dull, too, being full of only this stuff.

 

Tolstoy needs to discuss his views on history a bit, as he tries to explain how the war of 1812 flowed, how the French won almost every battle yet lost the war, how the inaction of the Russians led to the greatest success. He wants to explain how "Great Men" don't change wars and history, that the flow of human history will happen irrespective of Great Men. A view with which I strongly differ.

 

But Tolstoy appears to be trying to contrast that with the love and happinness you can make in your own life, and to those closest to you. He's talking about the contrast between how you achieve personal redemption, and why that is what you should focus on rather than focussing on the bigger stage where neither you nor anyone else will genuinely change anything.

 

So the discussions on the nature of history are clearly relevent to the book, but they are just too long winded (and, to my mind, wrong).

 

The other thing that drags, for me, is a typical tendency in Victorian novels for the characters to spend too long on introspection, and have moments of epiphane when they suddenly change their entire outlook on life; to me neither of these things seems particularly realistic, although perhaps that's because of my modern sensitivities.

 

But, these criticisms aside, it's still a wonderful book once you battle past the swarms of characters and determine who is who. Something that's pretty inevitable in a 1400 page novel.

I would take me from now until christmas to read the book because of the amount of pages to turn
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 year later...

Only Tolstoy book I've read is Hadji Murad. I need to re-read it because I didn't get a full grip of the book the first time around. I have Anna Karenina and War & Peace, but have read neither.

 

What I didn't like about Hadji Murad is how Tolstoy treated characters. He would bring some characters in just to only take them out of the book a few pages later.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've wanted to read War and Peace, but I haven't had the time or energy to really commit myself to a book like that. My Humanities teacher called the book "possibly the best book ever written." To the people who have read it, do you agree? I read your thoughts, Andy, and was really intrigued, and I think I'll cautiously give it a try sometime next year.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I thought War and Peace was a great book, the characters, the romance the battles and the wars were brilliantly written. There were parts that dragged and seemed unnecessarily longwinded, and I did skip through these pages, I confess. I agree with Andys thoughts pretty much. Is it the best book ever written? I honestly don`t know, haven`t read enough of the classics to judge. I would reccomend reading War & Peace though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

I've been wanting to read War and Peace for so long now. The problem is i have so many other books on the go at once. I need to set myself a target of finishing what books I am reading and forcing myself not to pick up any more.

 

Think if you are going to read such a classic you really have to give it your full attention. Of course this is just my humble opinion:)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

War and Peace sat on the shelf for about two years. I own an old, shabby copy of Constance Garnett's questionable translation which I have only just found the courage to read. Today I'm at page 571 and am completely enthralled. If you haven't read it yet, you should. It's superb.

 

It really is fantastic, isn't it? It took a while for me to get into when I was reading it; and I was nervous because I'd failed when trying to read it in my late teens - I don't think I had enough knowledge or experience to understand it, and I was very, very lazy and couldn't remember the characters (it became much easier once I kind of understood (or at least, spotted) the Russian patronymic, and could notice where the same character had different titles).

 

But once over the couple of small barriers, it just becomes a really, really great book. It's a giant love and battles romp, beautifully written. And because it's based around a very defined war, I didn't even feel like it was either too long, or wanted it to continue for ever like you do with some books like this. It's huge, but it's also just right, I think. Particularly with the first epilogue helping out with the aftermath.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...