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aduda06's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Happily Ever After- 4/5
The Death of Ivan Ilyich- 5/5
The Cossacks- 3.5/5
The Death of Ivan Ilyich- 5/5
The Cossacks- 3.5/5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
rlgreen91's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
A short opinion about each short story in this quite short collection:
"Family Happiness" - Wow, so much of this could have been avoided by just opening your mouth and communicating.
"The Death of Ivan Ilych" - Beautifully tragic as we all realize each of us is in fact Caius.
"The Kruetzer Sonata" - Really feel sorry for the narrator stuck listening to this incel manifesto rant full of $5 SAT words.
"Hadji Murad" - Also beautifully tragic because it seemed inevitable.
It's always a bit hard to rate short story collections because some resonate more than others. Still, it was pretty good - maybe I'll get around to reading War and Peace sometime. 4 stars.
"Family Happiness" - Wow, so much of this could have been avoided by just opening your mouth and communicating.
"The Death of Ivan Ilych" - Beautifully tragic as we all realize each of us is in fact Caius.
"The Kruetzer Sonata" - Really feel sorry for the narrator stuck listening to this incel manifesto rant full of $5 SAT words.
"Hadji Murad" - Also beautifully tragic because it seemed inevitable.
It's always a bit hard to rate short story collections because some resonate more than others. Still, it was pretty good - maybe I'll get around to reading War and Peace sometime. 4 stars.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Domestic abuse, and Suicidal thoughts
Moderate: Abortion, Violence, Alcoholism, Murder, and War
Minor: Drug use and Child death
toffishay's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
This is a valuable collection, especially since I was interested in reading Russian classics and had never read Tolstoy before. As with all short story collections, some are going be better or more to your taste than others. This edition is brought down by "Hadji Murad", which I really did not enjoy. It is a 100+ page long biographical war story that I found to be very dry and just not to my taste. My favorite is the titular "The Death of Ivan Ilych". It was genuinely distressing, macabre, and honest about the fear of death and that you have lived your whole life wrong. The other two stories in this collection, "Family Happiness" and "The Kreutzer Sonata", were strong and interesting because of the way that they engaged with what was known at the time as the 'woman question', even if the ways that Tolstoy did it was limited. Woman are presented more as archetypes than as characters, even in "Family Happiness" were the story is from Masha's perspective. But it is interesting to read how marriage served as financial and social outlet from women who were limited in society, but was also one of the most emotionally and physically dangerous situations for them to be in. For that piece alone, I think that these two stories are valuable for a reader who is interested in engaging with conversations about marriage particularly as a Western construct that has such a base in oppression and how that continues to this day.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Toxic relationship, Death, Murder, Domestic abuse, and Violence
Moderate: Sexism, Xenophobia, War, Infidelity, Misogyny, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Sexual harassment, Colonisation, Gun violence, and Sexual violence
lavenderdolmeh's review against another edition
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Only read The Death of II.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
skylarmarija's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I thoroughly enjoyed Family Happiness and Master and Man, but was not as crazy about the Kreutzer Sonata—I found it very slow. Overall, this was a great find by Tolstoy and I enjoyed it!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Death, Suicide attempt, and Terminal illness
fyodoralekseyev's review
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Absolutely brilliant. It seems a lot of the reviews are for only the Death of Ivan Ilyich (Silly vintage books, name your things better!) but I honestly mainly loved the Forged Coupon. In my opinion the Devil is a better Kreutzer Sonata haha
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
missbear's review against another edition
dark
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
I was gifted this book several years ago, immediately after reading and absolutely falling in love with Anna Karenina. Anna Karenina will always be my favorite, but I did really enjoy these stories as well, which captured much of the philosophical spirit and smooth, easy writing that I associate with Tolstoy.
The thing that is always the most intriguing to me about Tolstoy is how artfully he describes characters' feelings, perspectives and understandings of the world. To this end, "The Death of Ivan Ilych" was a chilling masterpiece, digging into the psychological state of a tragic character in a fascinating and terrifying way. I also particularly enjoyed "The Kreutzer Sonata," which followed an even more unlikable character. I may not agree with Tolstoy's views about romantic relationships, but I certainly enjoy reading about these twisted, horrible ones.
It's not just the characters, it's that I always find moments in Tolstoy's work where he captures so perfectly and eloquently an emotional state that I've experienced before, but had trouble putting into words or even identifying. Two such moments stood out to me especially in "The Kreutzer Sonata":
in one, a character describes the almost disturbing power of music to bend our emotions to its will, in the other, he explains the "ecstasy" of a fit of anger and despair. I'll leave them here.
"Music makes me forget myself, my real position; it transports me to some other position not my own. Under the influence of music, it seems to me that I feel what I do not really feel, that I understand what I do not understand, that I can do what I cannot do. I explain it by the fact that music acts like yawning, like laughter: I am not sleepy, but I yawn when I see someone yawning; there is nothing for me to laugh at, but I laugh when I hear people laughing."
"An old conversation I had had with Trukhachevski's brother came to my mind, and in a kind of ecstasy I rent my heart with that conversation, making it refer to Trukhachevski and my wife."
The thing that is always the most intriguing to me about Tolstoy is how artfully he describes characters' feelings, perspectives and understandings of the world. To this end, "The Death of Ivan Ilych" was a chilling masterpiece, digging into the psychological state of a tragic character in a fascinating and terrifying way. I also particularly enjoyed "The Kreutzer Sonata," which followed an even more unlikable character. I may not agree with Tolstoy's views about romantic relationships, but I certainly enjoy reading about these twisted, horrible ones.
It's not just the characters, it's that I always find moments in Tolstoy's work where he captures so perfectly and eloquently an emotional state that I've experienced before, but had trouble putting into words or even identifying. Two such moments stood out to me especially in "The Kreutzer Sonata":
in one, a character describes the almost disturbing power of music to bend our emotions to its will, in the other, he explains the "ecstasy" of a fit of anger and despair. I'll leave them here.
"Music makes me forget myself, my real position; it transports me to some other position not my own. Under the influence of music, it seems to me that I feel what I do not really feel, that I understand what I do not understand, that I can do what I cannot do. I explain it by the fact that music acts like yawning, like laughter: I am not sleepy, but I yawn when I see someone yawning; there is nothing for me to laugh at, but I laugh when I hear people laughing."
"An old conversation I had had with Trukhachevski's brother came to my mind, and in a kind of ecstasy I rent my heart with that conversation, making it refer to Trukhachevski and my wife."
Content Warnings
Graphic: Chronic illness, Death, and Murder
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