|
|
 |
Essay on Anna Karenina By Leo Tolstoy (1828 - 1910)
| Date: |
06-15-01 6:00am |
| Subject: |
Novels |
| Word Count: |
1598 |
| Page Count: |
6.39 |
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (1828 - 1910)
Anna Karenina
by Leo Tolstoy (1828
- 1910)
Type of Work:
Tragic love story
Setting
Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia; nineteenth
century
Principal Characters
Robert Jordan, an American fighting with
Spanish Loyalists
Anna Karenina, a beautiful young woman
Alexey, her cold, vindictive husband
Count Vronsky, a young military officer
who falls in love with Anna
Stepan Oblonsky, Anna's spendthrift brother
Dolly, Stepan's frustrated wife
Kitty, Dolly's sister
Levin, Stepan's rusticc friend, and Kitty's
suitor
Story Overveiw
Stepan Oblonsky's wife Dolly had discovered
that her husband was having an affair. With her beauty fading and her household
a wreck, she had had enough. Stepan fretfully wrote to his sister, Anna
Karenina, asking her to come to Moscow and convince Dolly not to leave
him.
Later, while working at his job in the
entrenched Moscow bureaucracy, Stepan received an unexpected visitor: Levin,
an old friend from the university, came to discuss Dolly's sister Kitty,
whom he wanted to marry. After being informed by Stepan that he had a rival
for Kitty's affections, a certain Count Vronskv of St. Petersburg, Levin
resolved that he would propose to Kitty that very night.
At that same moment, Anna and Count Vronsky
were riding together in a train bound for Moscow. Vronsky noticed the charming
woman as he made his way to the first-class compartment that he shared
with his mother. He had time to take note of "the suppressed eagerness
which played over her face" as their eyes met, and she remained in his
mind. However, upon reaching their destination, the two went their separate
ways - Anna to her brother's home, Vronsky and his mother to a hotel.
Approached by Anna, Dolly at first refused
to discuss her husband's infidelity. "Everything's lost after what has
happened, evervthinq's over!" she raged. But finally she relented to Anna's
plea to keep the family together.
Meanwhile, Levin had arrived early at a
dinner party hosted by the parents of Kitty and Dolly, determined to make
his desires known to Kitty before the appearance of the rich and handsome
Count. But "That cannot be ... forgive me," Kitty replied upon hearing
his stammering proposal. Crushed by the rejection, Levin escaped from the
gathering at the first opportunity.
A few days later, at her coming-out ball,
Kitty couldn't help but notice how Anna and Vronsky kept gazing at each
other. Vronsky's face had a look that puzzled her . . . "like the expression
of an intelligent dog when it had done wrong." It was clear to Kitty that
the two were in love.
Nevertheless, with her task of seeing to
Stepan and Dolly completed, Anna boarded the next train for St. Petersburg.
She thought of her son, Seryozha, and her husband, Alexey..... Mv life
will go on in the old way, all nice and as usual ' "' she thought. But
she found that she could not easily dismiss Count Vronsky from her mind.
And stepping along the way, as Anna stepped out for a breath of air, there
he was. "You know that I have come to be where you are; I can't help it,"
confessed the officer. Anna was both delighted and flattered by this, but
it was simply unthinkable that anything could come of his attraction to
her. After all, she was a married woman.
Back in Moscow, Kitty was devastated. Not
only had Count Vronsky spurned her, but Levin had also left the city to
supervise work on his country estate. Humiliated and distraught, Kitty
became so ill with despair that she was soon unable to eat or sleep. Her
frantic parents, after finding no restorative medical treatment in Moscow,
sent her to Europe to consult various doctors.
Meanwhile, life for Anna in St. Petersburg
remained strangely unsettled. The happiness that in Moscow "had fairly
flashed from her eyes, [now seemed] hidden somewhere far away." To her
further disquiet, the love-struck Vronsky took every opportunity to see
her. One night she knelt and begged him to leave her in peace; but still
he persisted: "I can't think of you and myself apart. You and I are one
to me." And at that moment Anna "let her eyes rest on him, full of love."
Soon afterward, Alexey Karenina walked
into a party and found his wife with Vronsky; but Anna denied any impropriety.
Still, she and Vronsky met night after night, with Alexey seemingly powerless
or unwilling to stop them. Anna by now felt "so sinful, so guilty"; but
still she could not curb her passion for the Count.
The following summer, while staving at
her husband's villa outside the city, Anna confronted her lover with an
announcement: she was pregnant. Though he understood the gravity of Anna's
position, Vronsky smiled. This was the "turning point he had been longing
for."
"Leave your husband and make our life one,"
he implored. But Anna shook her head. If she left, Alexey would take sole
custody of Seryozha and she would not be allowed to see her son. But Anna
did promise Vronsky that she would tell her husband the truth about the
child she was carrying.
When Anna made her confession, Alexey,
instead of showing jealousy or indignation, merely warned his wife against"public displays of flirtation." His sole concern was to preserve his social
and business reputation; a duel or a divorce would only serve to disgrace
him. "The family cannot be broken up by a whim, a caprice, or even by the
sin of one of the partners in the marriage," he informed Anna...... Our
life must go on as it has done in the past."
Anna reacted to his words at first with
guilt and shame, but this quickly turned to anger: "He knows that I can't
repent that I breathe, that I love; he knows that it can lead to nothing
but lying and deceit- but he wants to go on torturing me . . . " Vronsky
also was increasingly anxious to begin a new life with Anna, who would
not leave her son. And so, "the position was one of misery for all three...
"
Kitty had by now returned to Moscow, feeling
somewhat better. One morning, just after dawn, Levin caught sight of her
in a carriage, as it skirted his estate destined for her family's summer
home. The pangs of love, long since buried, welled up in him once more.
Months later, taking advantage of a trip to the city, he called again upon
Kitty. It was apparent to both that they cared deeply for each other, and,
after a proper courtship, they were united as man and wife. Levin, for
years caught up in trying to find out who he was and where he fit in God's
universe, had finally and happily found his place.
But in St. Petersburg, relationships were
breaking up. The nearer Anna came to the birth of her child, the more demanding
and cold Alexey became. Then Anna survived a deadly fever to give birth
to a baby girl. Oddly, the difficulty of the birth eased the tensions between
herself and her husband. At the other extreme, Vronsky saw no end to the
barriers separating him from his lover. Desperate at the prospect of living
without Anna, he unsuccessfully tried shooting himself. Still torn, Anna
finally did move in with him, and soon the couple left Russia to live in
Italy for a time.
Meanwhile, Kitty and Levin were living
on their estate outside of Moscow. Levin felt gratified to be spiritually
sustained by a loving wife. Like Anna, Kitty went through a difficult pregnancy,
but it culminated in the birth of a fine little boy. Theirs was an idyllic
life.
Upon returning from Italy to St. Petersburg,
Vronsky and Anna, found themselves ostracized. Gossip followed them everywhere.
The couple argued frequently, and Anna, in a burst of depression, finally
accused Vronsky of being unfaithful. Even after they moved into a newly-inherited
estate, Anna felt alone in the world. She revived her habit of taking a
little morphine to help her sleep, a legacy from her pregnancy.
Summer turned to winter, and the family
relocated again, this time to Moscow. There, the badly strained relationship
fared no better. Though Anna pled for Vronsky to love her and give her
security, at the same time she increasingly insisted on greater freedom.
"This is becoming unbearable!" Vronsky screamed one day. "Why do you try
my patience? It has limits." Anna could only gaze at him "with terror at
the undisguised hatred in his whole face." Vronsky checked himself: "I
mean to say ... I must ask what it is you want of me?" "All I want," she
replied, "is that you don't desert me, as you think of doing .... I want
love, and there is none. .. " Vronsky vainly protested; he would never
cease to love her.
Suddenly, Anna turned on Vronsky, cursing
him for the sacrifices she had made to be with him - her marriage, her
son, her social position ...
Delirious with bitterness, Anna had no
place to turn; Vronsky, she was convinced, had found another, and she could
never return to Alexey. Ambling into the train station, she purchased a
ticket. Then, standing on the platform, watching the trains, she said to
herself..... I will punish him and escape from everyone and from myself."
Measuring both the speed of the oncoming
train and her resolve to end her suffering, she jumped. "... Something
huge and merciless struck her on the head and rolled on her back.... 'Lord,
forgive me all!"
Anna Karenina was dead.
Commentary
Leo Tolstoy is considered one of Russia's
greatest nineteenth-century novelists, an honor he shares with Dostoievsky.
Tolstoy, however, focuses his novels on the vicissitudes of the upper-classes
rather than on Dostoievsky's underprivileged peasants or criminals.
Tolstoy foresaw the end of the aristocracy
in Russian society. Serfs had already been set free; the working class
was beginning to expand in power. Moreover, new mores and morals were being
imported from the West, and society's upper crust was the first to feel
the strain of these changes - a strain running an undercurrent throughout
Anna Karenina.
The novel reads like a soap opera, with
the exhaustive cast of characters continually creating their own problems.
Contrast Anna's tragic quest for love and personal fulfillment with the
spiritual odyssey of Levin. Through hard work and the support of an understanding
family, his search is rewarded by happiness. Thus, Tolstoy's gripping masterpiece
revolves around the dissimilar paths of these two characters, allowing
a forum for the author's commentary on Russia's maze-like social system,
fraught with unresolved incongruities.
Complete List:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
|