Lev Tolstoj

During a long train journey, the passengers begin a discussion on the institution of marriage. Can there be spiritual affinity in married life, or is it nothing more than > a horrifying hell, on account of which one ends up an alcoholic, shoots oneself, or commits murder ? The conversation is abruptly interrupted when a traveler declares that he is “the one who, fancy that, killed his wife.”

The book deals with the Napoleonic Wars, and in particular the French invasion of Russia, the sacking of Moscow, and the defeat of Napoleon. In the early parts of the novel, war is something distant, a matter for the powerful and their diplomatic games, whereas > life, the real life of men, with its fundamental necessities concerning health, illness, work, rest... , proceeded, as always, indep

The novel relates two parallel storylines originating in Kitty’s refusal to marry Levin, favoring the handsome and dashing officer Vronsky. From this act of vanity and levity, immediately undone by Vronsky falling in love with Anna Karenina, Levin’s trajectory begins: his love for the countryside, his rapprochement with Kitty culminating in marriage and the discovery of faith; while Anna’s sorrow