Tolstoy may not be showing that much of Russia at that time even. It's hard to tell. You tend to associate the quality of the period with what's lasted - what's still good. And that quality becomes the whole period.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
In 'A Confession,' Tolstoy found meaning that he could hold on to, and he lived for another 30 years.
Chechnya forms the bookends to Tolstoy's career. He began writing his first novel, 'Childhood,' while in Starogladovskaya in Northern Chechnya, and his final novel, 'Hadji Murad,' is set in the Russo-Chechen War of the 19th century.
When I bought a collection of Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, I returned home with a bright enthusiasm to begin the long march into the Russian soul. Though I've failed to read either man to completion, they both helped me to imagine that my fictional South Carolina was as vast a literary acreage as their Russia.
My impressions of the Russian Revolution can be divided into two periods. The first period was when I showed deep sympathy. My second period is one of disappointment. This change was the result of close observation on the spot.
This is not Tolstoy. I don't want to know what critics and professors think of what I'm writing. It might hurt my feelings.
A great writer is a great writer... Tolstoy was not a woman, but 'Anna Karenina' is still a pretty good book.
What Tolstoy is on about is that carnal love is not a good idea.
There are two men in Tolstoy. He is a mystic and he is also a realist. He is addicted to the practice of a pietism that for all its sincerity is nothing if not vague and sentimental; and he is the most acute and dispassionate of observers, the most profound and earnest student of character and emotion.
I'm never going to be Tolstoy.
The great drama of Russian history has been between its state and society. Put simply, Russia has always had too much state and not enough society.