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Title: Anna Karenina
Series:
(The Russians)
Author: Leo Tolstoy
Rating:
5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Classic
Pages:
1287
Words: 350K
From Wikipedia
Part
1
The
novel opens with a scene that introduces Prince Stepan Arkadyevich
Oblonsky ("Stiva"), a Moscow aristocrat and civil servant
who has been unfaithful to his wife, Princess Darya Alexandrovna
("Dolly"). Dolly has discovered his affair with the
family's governess, and the household and family are in turmoil.
Stiva informs the household that his married sister, Anna Arkadyevna
Karenina, is coming to visit from Saint Petersburg in a bid to calm
the situation.
Meanwhile,
Stiva's childhood friend, Konstantin Dmitrievich Levin ("Kostya"),
arrives in Moscow with the aim of proposing to Dolly's youngest
sister, Princess Katerina Alexandrovna Shcherbatskaya ("Kitty").
Levin is a passionate, restless, but shy aristocratic landowner who,
unlike his Moscow friends, chooses to live in the country on his
large estate. He discovers that Kitty is also being pursued by Count
Alexei Kirillovich Vronsky, an army cavalry officer.
Whilst
at the railway station to meet Anna, Stiva bumps into Vronsky who is
there to meet his mother, the Countess Vronskaya. Anna and Vronskaya
have traveled and talked together in the same carriage. As the family
members are reunited, and Vronsky sees Anna for the first time, a
railway worker accidentally falls in front of a train and is killed.
Anna interprets this as an "evil omen". Vronsky, however,
is infatuated with Anna, and donates two hundred roubles to the dead
man's family, which impresses her. Anna is also uneasy about leaving
her young son, Sergei ("Seryozha"), alone for the first
time.
At
the Oblonsky home, Anna talks openly and emotionally to Dolly about
Stiva's affair and convinces her that Stiva still loves her despite
the infidelity. Dolly is moved by Anna's speeches and decides to
forgive Stiva.
Kitty,
who comes to visit Dolly and Anna, is just eighteen. In her first
season as a debutante, she is expected to make an excellent match
with a man of her social standing. Vronsky has been paying her
considerable attention, and she expects to dance with him at a ball
that evening. Kitty is very struck by Anna's beauty and personality
and becomes infatuated with her just as Vronsky. When Levin proposes
to Kitty at her home, she clumsily turns him down, believing she is
in love with Vronsky and that he will propose to her, and encouraged
to do so by her mother, who believes Vronsky would be a better match
(in contrast to Kitty's father, who favors Levin).
At
the big ball Kitty expects to hear something definitive from Vronsky,
but he dances with Anna instead, choosing her as a partner over a
shocked and heartbroken Kitty. Kitty realizes that Vronsky has fallen
in love with Anna and has no intention of marrying her, despite his
overt flirtations. Vronsky has regarded his interactions with Kitty
merely as a source of amusement and assumes that Kitty has acted for
the same reasons. Anna, shaken by her emotional and physical response
to Vronsky, returns at once to St. Petersburg. Vronsky travels on the
same train. During the overnight journey, the two meet and Vronsky
confesses his love. Anna refuses him, although she is deeply affected
by his attentions to her.
Levin,
crushed by Kitty's refusal, returns to his estate, abandoning any
hope of marriage. Anna returns to her husband, Count Alexei
Alexandrovich Karenin, a senior government official, and her son,
Seryozha, in St. Petersburg. On seeing her husband for the first time
since her encounter with Vronsky, Anna realizes that she finds him
unattractive, though she tells herself he is a good man.
Part
2
The
Shcherbatskys consult doctors over Kitty's health, which has been
failing since Vronsky's rejection. A specialist advises that Kitty
should go abroad to a health spa to recover. Dolly speaks to Kitty
and understands she is suffering because of Vronsky and Levin, whom
she cares for and had hurt in vain. Kitty, humiliated by Vronsky and
tormented by her rejection of Levin, upsets her sister by referring
to Stiva's infidelity, saying she could never love a man who betrayed
her. Meanwhile, Stiva visits Levin on his country estate while
selling a nearby plot of land.
In
St. Petersburg, Anna begins to spend more time in the inner circle of
Princess Elizaveta ("Betsy"), a fashionable socialite and
Vronsky's cousin. Vronsky continues to pursue Anna. Although she
initially tries to reject him, she eventually succumbs to his
attentions and begins an affair. Meanwhile, Karenin reminds his wife
of the impropriety of paying too much attention to Vronsky in public,
which is becoming the subject of gossip. He is concerned about the
couple's public image, although he believes mistakenly that Anna is
above suspicion.
Vronsky,
a keen horseman, takes part in a steeplechase event, during which he
rides his mare Frou-Frou too hard—his irresponsibility causing him
to fall and break the horse's back. Anna is unable to hide her
distress during the accident. Before this, Anna had told Vronsky that
she is pregnant with his child. Karenin is also present at the races
and remarks to Anna that her behaviour is improper. Anna, in a state
of extreme distress and emotion, confesses her affair to her husband.
Karenin asks her to break it off to avoid further gossip, believing
that their marriage will be preserved.
Kitty
and her mother travel to a German spa to recover from her ill health.
There, they meet the wheelchair-bound Pietist Madame Stahl and the
saintly Varenka, her adopted daughter. Influenced by Varenka, Kitty
becomes extremely pious, but becomes disillusioned by her father's
criticism when she learns Madame Stahl is faking her illness. She
then returns to Moscow.
Part
3
Levin
continues working on his estate, a setting closely tied to his
spiritual thoughts and struggles. He wrestles with the idea of
falseness, wondering how he should go about ridding himself of it,
and criticising what he feels is falseness in others. He develops
ideas relating to agriculture, and the unique relationship between
the agricultural labourer and his native land and culture. He comes
to believe that the agricultural reforms of Europe will not work in
Russia because of the unique culture and personality of the Russian
peasant.
When
Levin visits Dolly, she attempts to understand what happened between
him and Kitty and to explain Kitty's behaviour. Levin is very
agitated by Dolly's talk about Kitty, and he begins to feel distant
from Dolly as he perceives her loving behaviour towards her children
as false. Levin resolves to forget Kitty and contemplates the
possibility of marriage to a peasant woman. However, a chance
sighting of Kitty in her carriage makes Levin realize he still loves
her. Meanwhile, in St. Petersburg, Karenin refuses to separate from
Anna, insisting that their relationship will continue. He threatens
to take away Seryozha if she persists in her affair with Vronsky.
Part
4
When
Anna and Vronsky continue seeing each other, Karenin consults with a
lawyer about obtaining a divorce. During the time period, a divorce
in Russia could only be requested by the innocent party in an affair
and required either that the guilty party confessed—which would
ruin Anna's position in society and bar her from remarrying in the
Orthodox Church—or that the guilty party be discovered in the act
of adultery. Karenin forces Anna to hand over some of Vronsky's love
letters, which the lawyer deems insufficient as proof of the affair.
Stiva and Dolly argue against Karenin's drive for a divorce.
Karenin
changes his plans after hearing that Anna is dying after the
difficult birth of her daughter, Annie. At her bedside, Karenin
forgives Vronsky. However, Vronsky, embarrassed by Karenin's
magnanimity, unsuccessfully attempts suicide by shooting himself. As
Anna recovers, she finds that she cannot bear living with Karenin
despite his forgiveness and his attachment to Annie. When she hears
that Vronsky is about to leave for a military posting in Tashkent,
she becomes desperate. Anna and Vronsky reunite and elope to Europe,
leaving Seryozha and Karenin's offer of divorce.
Meanwhile,
Stiva acts as a matchmaker with Levin: he arranges a meeting between
him and Kitty, which results in their reconciliation and betrothal.
Part
5
Levin
and Kitty marry and start their new life on his country estate.
Although the couple are happy, they undergo a bitter and stressful
first three months of marriage. Levin feels dissatisfied at the
amount of time Kitty wants to spend with him and dwells on his
inability to be as productive as he was as a bachelor. When the
marriage starts to improve, Levin learns that his brother, Nikolai,
is dying of consumption. Kitty offers to accompany Levin on his
journey to see Nikolai and proves herself a great help in nursing
Nikolai. Seeing his wife take charge of the situation in an
infinitely more capable manner than he could have done himself
without her, Levin's love for Kitty grows. Kitty eventually learns
that she is pregnant.
In
Europe, Vronsky and Anna struggle to find friends who will accept
them. Whilst Anna is happy to be finally alone with Vronsky, he feels
suffocated. They cannot socialize with Russians of their own class
and find it difficult to amuse themselves. Vronsky, who believed that
being with Anna was the key to his happiness, finds himself
increasingly bored and unsatisfied. He takes up painting and makes an
attempt to patronize an émigré Russian artist of genius. However,
Vronsky cannot see that his own art lacks talent and passion, and
that his conversation about art is extremely pretentious.
Increasingly restless, Anna and Vronsky decide to return to Russia.
In
St. Petersburg, Anna and Vronsky stay in one of the best hotels, but
take separate suites. It becomes clear that whilst Vronsky is still
able to move freely in Russian society, Anna is barred from it. Even
her old friend, Princess Betsy, who has had affairs herself, evades
her company. Anna starts to become anxious that Vronsky no longer
loves her. Meanwhile, Karenin is comforted by Countess Lidia
Ivanovna, an enthusiast of religious and mystic ideas fashionable
with the upper classes. She advises him to keep Seryozha away from
Anna and to tell him his mother is dead. However, Seryozha refuses to
believe that this is true. Anna visits Seryozha uninvited on his
ninth birthday but is discovered by Karenin.
Anna,
desperate to regain at least some of her former position in society,
attends a show at the theatre at which all of St. Petersburg's high
society are present. Vronsky begs her not to go, but he is unable to
bring himself to explain to her why she cannot attend. At the
theatre, Anna is openly snubbed by her former friends, one of whom
makes a deliberate scene and leaves the theatre. Anna is devastated.
Unable to find a place for themselves in St. Petersburg, Anna and
Vronsky leave for Vronsky's own country estate.
Part
6
Dolly,
her mother the Princess Scherbatskaya, and Dolly's children spend the
summer with Levin and Kitty. The Levins' life is simple and
unaffected, although Levin is uneasy at the "invasion" of
so many Scherbatskys. He becomes extremely jealous when one of the
visitors, Veslovsky, flirts openly with the pregnant Kitty. Levin
tries to overcome his jealousy, and briefly succeeds during a hunt
with Veslovsky and Oblonsky, but eventually succumbs to his feelings
and orders Veslovsky to leave in an embarrassing scene. Veslovsky
immediately goes to stay with Anna and Vronsky at their nearby
estate.
When
Dolly visits Anna, she is struck by the difference between the
Levins' aristocratic-yet-simple home life and Vronsky's overtly
luxurious and lavish country estate. She is also unable to keep pace
with Anna's fashionable dresses or Vronsky's extravagant spending on
a hospital he is building. In addition, all is not quite well with
Anna and Vronsky. Dolly notices Anna's anxious behaviour and her
uncomfortable flirtations with Veslovsky. Vronsky makes an emotional
request to Dolly, asking her to convince Anna to divorce Karenin so
that the two might marry and live normally.
Anna
has become intensely jealous of Vronsky and cannot bear when he
leaves her, even for short excursions. When Vronsky leaves for
several days of provincial elections, Anna becomes convinced that she
must marry him to prevent him from leaving her. After Anna writes to
Karenin, she and Vronsky leave the countryside for Moscow.
Part
7
While
visiting Moscow for Kitty's confinement, Levin quickly gets used to
the city's fast-paced, expensive and frivolous society life. He
accompanies Stiva to a gentleman's club, where the two meet Vronsky.
Levin and Stiva pay a visit to Anna, who is occupying her empty days
by being a patroness to an orphaned English girl. Levin is initially
uneasy about the visit, but Anna easily puts him under her spell.
When he admits to Kitty that he has visited Anna, she accuses him of
falling in love with her. The couple are later reconciled, realising
that Moscow society life has had a negative, corrupting effect on
Levin.
Anna
cannot understand why she can attract a man like Levin, who has a
young and beautiful new wife, but can no longer attract Vronsky. Her
relationship with Vronsky is under increasing strain, because he can
move freely in Russian society while she remains excluded. Her
increasing bitterness, boredom, and jealousy cause the couple to
argue. Anna uses morphine to help her sleep, a habit she began while
living with Vronsky at his country estate. She has become dependent
on it. Meanwhile, after a long and difficult labour, Kitty gives
birth to a son, Dmitri, nicknamed "Mitya". Levin is both
horrified and profoundly moved by the sight of the tiny, helpless
baby.
Stiva
visits Karenin to seek his commendation for a new post. During the
visit, Stiva asks Karenin to grant Anna a divorce (which would
require him to confess to a non-existent affair), but Karenin's
decisions are now governed by a French "clairvoyant"
recommended by Lidia Ivanovna. The clairvoyant apparently had a
vision in his sleep during Stiva's visit and gives Karenin a cryptic
message that he interprets in a way such that he must decline the
request for divorce.
Anna
becomes increasingly jealous and irrational towards Vronsky, whom she
suspects of having love affairs with other women. She is also
convinced that he will give in to his mother's plans to marry him off
to a rich society woman. They have a bitter row and Anna believes the
relationship is over. She starts to think of suicide as an escape
from her torments. In her mental and emotional confusion, she sends a
telegram to Vronsky asking him to come home to her, and then pays a
visit to Dolly and Kitty. Anna's confusion and anger overcome her
and, in conscious symmetry with the railway worker's death on her
first meeting with Vronsky, from ground level at the end of a railway
platform, she throws herself with fatal intent between the wagon
wheelsets of a passing freight train.
Part
8
Sergei
Ivanovich's (Levin's brother) latest book is ignored by readers and
critics and he participates in the Russian commitment to Pan-Slavism.
Stiva gets the post he desired so much, and Karenin takes custody of
Vronsky and Anna's baby, Annie. A group of Russian volunteers,
including the suicidal Vronsky, depart from Russia to fight in the
Orthodox Bulgarian revolt that has broken out against the Turks, more
broadly identified as the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878).
A
lightning storm occurs at Levin's estate while his wife and newborn
son are outdoors and, in his fear for their safety, Levin realizes
that he does indeed love his son as much as he loves Kitty. Kitty's
family is concerned that a man as altruistic as her husband does not
consider himself to be a Christian.
After
speaking at length to a peasant, Levin has a true change of heart,
concluding that he does believe in the Christian principles taught to
him in childhood and no longer questions his faith. He realizes that
one must decide for oneself what is acceptable concerning one's own
faith and beliefs. He chooses not to tell Kitty of the change that he
has undergone.
Levin
is initially displeased that his return to his faith does not bring
with it a complete transformation to righteousness. However, at the
end of the story, Levin arrives at the conclusion that despite his
newly accepted beliefs, he is human and will go on making mistakes.
His life can now be meaningfully and truthfully oriented toward
righteousness.
Before I talk about this book in particular, I want to discuss this
“series” in general. In my quest to be more generally well-read I
have included “The Complete Works” of several authors like GK
Chesterton, CS Lewis, The Bronte Sisters and now, four different
Russian authors. Included are Leo Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Ivan
Turgenev and Nikolai Gogol. I shall be cycling through these four
russian authors. Obviously, this particular little literary project,
much like my Dickens
Project, will take years to complete. Given what I am
learning about myself as a long term reader, I suspect there will be
breaks to prevent burnout and boredom. But that being said, I have
read enough russian classics before to know that I have a russian
soul and these stories resonate with me just like Dickens' stories
did.
On to this book in particular.
When I read this for the first time in 2004, I summed it up in one
sentence and gave it 3stars. Looking back, I can understand my casual
dismissal of this book. Massive (at over 1200 pages this is one big
book!), sprawling in scope (over 12 main characters) and chock full
to the gills with russian culture, it is easy to think “lets just
get through this”. Ahhhh, what a callow youth I was in those days.
Considered by “them” to be one of the greatest novels ever
written, Anna Karenina is a study in fallen humanity. Tolstoy
was a Christian and while Jesus is never mentioned nor the Bible
itself, the church is explicitly talked about. At first it bothered
me but I just realized it was one of those “cultural” things. I
suspect as I read through these russian authors that I'll be
experiencing a lot of that.
This took me over two weeks to complete. Not because I didn't pick it
up every day (because I did) but because I actually just slowed down
and enjoyed reading this instead of consuming like I do so much of my
SFF books. I didn't take any notes but I think when I start the next
russian book that I'll grab some sort of notebook and scribble stuff
down as I go along. I don't do well with taking notes on my kindle
and remembering to look them up afterwards just doesn't happen. I
need a physical notebook. Even if I end up not using 99% of the
scribblings, at least I will have gotten them out of my head and onto
a page. Some books deserve to be thought about and mulled over
instead of just inhaled.
Thinking about this book, I'd love to be one of those people who can
write pages on the meanings of everything in the book. It is a rich,
complex and fulfilling book and I want to do it justice. That being
said, I know I simply don't operate that way. I hardly ever write
long reviews, much less even medium reviews.
In regards to the translation. I have one of those 99cent “Complete
Works of Tolstoy” that I got from Amazon so I don' know if the
translator was even listed. * heads out to check * Nope, no
translator is listed. I noticed nothing egregious though so that
shouldn't b a worry for anyone.
★★★★★
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