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War and Peace
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War and Peace (1869) (edit title/settings)

by Leo Tolstoy (Author) (edit contributors)

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War and Peace (Russian: Война и мир, Pre-reform Russian: «Война и миръ») is a novel by the Russian author Leo Tolstoy, published in 1869. The work is epic in scale and is considered one of the most celebrated works of fiction. It is regarded as Tolstoy's finest literary achievement, along with... read more

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  • “Wealth, power, life itself, all the things that men put so much effort into building up and maintaining, if they have any value at all, are never worth more than the pleasure to be had by renouncing them.”
    Pierre
  • “At moments of departure and change of life people capable of reflecting on their actions usually get into a serious state of mind. At these moments they usually take stock of the past and make plans for the future.”
    Narrator
  • “Never, never marry, my friend. That’s my advice: never marry till you can say to yourself that you have done all you are capable of, and until you have ceased to love the woman of your choice and have seen her plainly as she is, or else you will make a cruel and irrevocable mistake. Marry when you are old and good for nothing—or all that is good and noble in you will be lost. It will all be wasted on trifles. Yes! Yes! Yes! Don’t look at me with such surprise. If you marry expecting anything from yourself in the future, you will feel at every step that for you all is ended, all is closed except the drawing room, where you will be ranged side by side with a court lackey and an idiot…”
    Prince Andre
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  • There are two sides to the life of every man, his individual life, which is the more free the more abstract its interests, and his elemental hive life in which he inevitably obeys laws laid down for him.
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  • there are only two sources of human vice—idleness and superstition, and only two virtues—activity and intelligence.
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  • Anna Pavlovna Scherer, maid of honor and favorite of the Empress Marya Fedorovna.
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  • 'All we can know is that we know nothing. And that's the height of human wisdom.'
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  • On the twelfth of June, 1812, the forces of Western Europe crossed the Russian frontier and war began, that is, an event took place opposed to human reason and to human nature. Millions of men perpetrated against one another such innumerable crimes, frauds, treacheries, thefts, forgeries, issues of false money, burglaries, incendiarisms, and murders as in whole centuries are not recorded in the annals of all the law courts of the world, but which those who committed them did not at the time regard as being crimes.
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  • An inner voice tells us we are in the wrong if we are idle. If man could find a state in which he felt that though idle he was fulfilling his duty, he would have found one of the conditions of man's primitive blessedness. And such a state of obligatory and irreproachable idleness is the lot of a whole class—the military. The chief attraction of military service has consisted and will consist in this compulsory and irreproachable idleness.
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  • The doctrines of original sin, of the Atonement, of the Trinity, of the Resurrection, are, according; to Tolstoy, all without foundation and contrary to Christ's teaching.
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  • He had the unfortunate capacity many men, especially Russians, have of seeing and believing in the possibility of goodness and truth, but of seeing the evil and falsehood of life too clearly to be able to take a serious part in it.
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  • that meeting he was struck for the first time by the endless variety of men's minds, which prevents a truth from ever presenting itself identically to two persons.
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  • In historic events the so-called great men are labels giving names to events, and like labels they have but the smallest connection with the event itself. Every act of theirs, which appears to them an act of their own will, is in an historical sense involuntary and is related to the whole course of history and predestined from eternity.
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First Sentence edit see section history

'Well, Prince, Genoa and Lucca are now nothing more than estates taken over by the Buonaparte family.

Themes & Symbolism edit see section history

  • The Limits of Leadership: Tolstoy explores characters on both the highest and lowest rungs of the social ladder in War and Peace, giving us realistic portraits of peasants and tsars, servants and emperors. Consequently, we not only get a close look at lofty leaders like Napoleon and Alexander, but also a chance to view them against the backdrop of society as a whole, an opportunity to assess these leaders’ overall usefulness and role on a general level. In this regard, Tolstoy gives us a no-nonsense, democratic evaluation of princes, generals, and other supposed leaders—and the result is not very flattering. Nicholas’s first glimpse of Alexander produces surprise at the fact that the tsar is just an ordinary man. Our view of Napoleon is even worse: when we see him in his bathroom getting his plump little body rubbed down, it is hard to imagine him as the grand conqueror of Europe. Tolstoy’s philosophy of history justifies his cynicism toward leaders, for, in his view, history is not a creation of great men, but is rather the result of millions of individual chains of cause and effect too small to be analyzed independently. Even emperors, though they may imagine they rule the world, are caught in these chains of circumstance.
  • The Irrationality of Human Motives: Although a large portion of War and Peace focuses on war, which is associated in our minds with clear-headed strategy and sensible reasoning, Tolstoy constantly emphasizes the irrational motives for human behavior in both peace and war. Wisdom is linked not to reason but to an acceptance of how mysterious our actions can be, even to ourselves. General Kutuzov emerges as a great leader not because he develops a logical plan and then demands that everyone follow it, but rather because he is willing to adapt to the flow of events and think on his feet. He revises his plan as each stage turns out to be vastly different from what was expected. Similarly irrational actions include Nicholas’s sudden decision to wed Mary after previously resolving to go back to Sonya, and Natasha’s surprising marriage to Pierre. Yet almost all the irrational actions we see in the novel turn out successfully, in accordance with instincts in human life that, for Tolstoy, lie far deeper than our reasoning minds.
  • The Search for the Meaning of Life: Several characters in War and Peace experience sudden revelations about the absurdity of existence. Andrew, for instance, has a near-death experience at Austerlitz that shows him a glimpse of the truth behind the falsity of earthly life. While Andrew needs a brush with death to bring about this spiritual vision, Pierre spends most of the novel wondering why his life is so empty and artificial. The immediate cause of Pierre’s philosophizing is his marriage to the wrong woman, but his pondering goes beyond Helene alone, to include the vast mystery of why humans are put on Earth. Pierre’s involvement with the mystical practice of Freemasonry constitutes his attempt to give meaning to his life. Tolstoy, however, shows the inadequacies of this approach, as Pierre grows bored with the Masons and dissatisfied with their passivity. Pierre’s involvement with politics, shown in his short-lived, crazy obsession with assassinating Napoleon, is equally shallow. What finally gives meaning to Pierre’s life is the experience of real love with Natasha.
  • Death as a Revelation: Death in War and Peace is never just a biological end, but almost always a moral event that brings some philosophical revelation. The first major instance of death as a revelation is Andrew’s near-death experience at Austerlitz, when he lies on the field blissfully aware of how little the external world matters and rejoicing that its burden has been lifted from his shoulders. Andrew does not even care that Napoleon himself passes by and comments on him, as earthly values of rank and power have lost all their meaning to him. Tolstoy’s portrayals of death’s revelatory power also include epiphanies some characters experience upon the deaths of others. One example is Pierre’s powerful reaction to the execution of the Russian prisoners of war in the French army camp, which leads him to radical thoughts on the insanity of war and the brotherhood of mankind. Pierre’s reverence for the inspirational Platon makes the latter’s execution prompt an existential crisis in Pierre. Similarly, Andrew’s death leads Natasha to a profound change in her outlook, making her far more reflective and serious than ever before. Perhaps Natasha, without the experience of grieving for Andrew, would never become mature enough to marry Pierre in the end. In this sense, death is not merely the end of life, but a powerful lesson in faith and philosophy.
  • Inexplicable Love: War and Peace is full of romantic mate-choices made without a full grasp of their consequences, some of them with disastrous results. Pierre marries the beautiful Helene in a daze of sexual passion and naïve trust, and his life almost immediately becomes a constant torment as Helene cheats on him with his friend. Natasha is smitten with the rakish Anatole and prepares to elope with him without seeing that his irresponsible ways would bring her to misery. Her crush on Anatole costs her a chance with Andrew, who cannot forgive her lapse. In both cases, an unreasoned romantic impulse ends up being destructive. Yet Tolstoy does not condemn irrational love. The two great love stories that conclude the novel—between Natasha and Pierre and between Mary and Nicholas—both take their lovers, and us as readers, by surprise. It suddenly occurs to all of them that they are in love, despite having very different expectations in mind. Unexplained love can be a horrible mistake, but it can also be wonderful. At its best, unpredictable love is a symbol of the mysterious forces of human life and instinct that cannot be denied.
  • Financial Loss: The loss of substantial amounts of money or property is a recurrent motif throughout the novel, and is associated in particular with the Rostov family. The family’s fortunes are already in decline at the beginning of the novel, as the irresponsible Count Rostov has dissipated his children’s inheritance through careless spending. Nicholas’s gambling losses accelerate the decline, and then the family is forced to abandon their Moscow home and most of their belongings as the French invade the city. But these financial losses are not necessarily signs of failure. Tolstoy, who himself gave away possessions in search of spiritual regeneration later in life, shows in War and Peace the positive side of the Rostovs’ material misfortunes. Count Rostov’s gracious payment of Nicholas’s debts shows a powerful connection between father and son, a connection that Nicholas affirms by vowing to repay his debt in five years. His early financial losses appear to leave him wiser, and later in life he becomes a savvy landowner. Moreover, the Rostov spirit for life, unhindered by compromised finances, ends up breeding charismatic children who marry into two of the largest fortunes in Russia—that of the Bolkonskis and that of the Bezukhovs. In a sense, Tolstoy may even be hinting that financial carelessness has the capacity to ultimately produce a spiritual richness worth far more than the mere material wealth.

Series & Lists edit see section history

This book is in Books to Read in 2011. (community list)
This book is in Time Magazine's 10 Greatest Books of All Time. (authoritative list)
This is book 1 of 96 in Newsweek's Top 100 Books: The Meta-List. (authoritative list)

Followed by 1984.

This is book 20 of 196 in BBC 'Big Read' Top 200 Novels, 2003. (authoritative list)

Preceded by Corelli's Mandolin, and followed by Gone With the Wind.

This is book 24 of 95 in Telegraph Top 100 Books, 2008. (authoritative list)

Preceded by Bleak House, and followed by The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

This is book 2 of 91 in The Novel 100: A Ranking of the Greatest Novels of All Time, 2004. (authoritative list)

Preceded by Don Quixote, and followed by Ulysses.

This is book 857 of 1272 in 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. (authoritative list)

Preceded by He Knew He Was Right, and followed by Sentimental Education.

This is book 77 of 96 in Wikipedia's 100 most influential books ever written. (authoritative list)

Preceded by Experiments in Plant Hybridisation, and followed by A treatise on electricity and magnetism.

This book is in 100 Fantabulous Book Challenge. (community list)
This book is in Penguin's Top 100 Classics. (authoritative list)
This book is in Random Synapses: 100 Book Reading Challenge (2011). (community list)
This book is in Guardian 1000 Novels Everyone Must Read. (authoritative list)
This book is in Big Fat Books. (community list)

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

  1. Leo Tolstoy (Author)

Other Contributors:

  1. Aylmer Maude (Translator)
  2. Andrew Bromfield (Translator)
  3. Ann Dunnigan (Translator)
  4. Rosemary Edmonds (Translator)
  5. Constance Garnett (Translator)
  6. George Gibian (Editor)
  7. Louise Shanks Maude (Translator)
  8. Richard Pevear (Translator)
  9. Staffan Skott (Translator)
  10. Larissa Volokhonsky (Translator)

First Edition edit see section history

Original Language: Russian
Publisher: Russkii Vestnik
Country: Russia
Publication Date: 1869
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 1444

Awards edit see section history

Classification edit see section history

  • Library of Congress: PG3366 .V6
  • Dewey: 891.733

Links to Supplemental Material edit see section history

Movie Connections edit see section history

  • War and Peace (1956) (IMDb): Starring Audrey Hepburn and Henry Fonda.
  • War and Peace (1972) (IMDb): TV mini-series staring Anthony Hopkins
  • War and Peace (IMDb): the critically acclaimed four-part film version War and Peace, by the Soviet director Sergei Bondarchuk, released individually in 1965-1967, and as a re-edited whole in 1968. This starred Lyudmila Savelyeva (as Natasha Rostova) and Vyacheslav Tikhonov (as Andrei Bolkonsky). Bondarchuk himself played the character of Pierre Bezukhov. The film was almost seven hours long; it involved thousands of actors, 120 000 extras, and it took seven years to finish the shooting, as a result of which the actors age changed dramatically from scene to scene. It won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film for its authenticity and massive scale.
  • Война и мир (Voyna i mir): The first Russian film adaptation of War and Peace was the 1915 film directed by Vladimir Gardin and starring Gardin and the Russian ballerina Vera Karalli.

Books That Cite This Book edit see section history

   
  • Library
  • Almost Chimpanzee
  • Conducting the Reference Interview
  • Japan Dreams: notes from an unreal country

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