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thelizabeth 's review for:
Anna Karenina
by Leo Tolstoy
Russians! They have so many feelings! I never knew it was true!
I really like this thing where I hit one epic per summer off the "before I die" list. Anna Karenina isn't something I'd have decided to read right now if a friend hadn't suggested we try it, but if not now, when? (drea warned: "There is probably not a lot about sperm." Glory be.)
It's true that calling this book Anna Karenina is like calling Middlemarch "Dorothea Brooke." (Dorothea at least shows up before page 50 of her book.) It isn't a book about her, but her story is its strongest beat. The way she changes and the things that happen to her are the most interesting. And it is, in my opinion, legitimately romantic. When she and Vronksy come together there is a table-sweeping feeling that is both fantasy and real. From the first, they know that they are twisting their lives out of shape for this, and the inevitability bonds them ecstatically. The sharp shock of love is there. And the way that people in love betray each other in little pieces -- loyally, while remaining in love -- is also there. Victories of happiness aren't pure, however much I so want to believe them.
Self, and not marriage, is Anna's enemy. Trying to get her needs met leaves her utterly stranded. In some ways her meltdown is so strong, it's one of those books that can give you a depressive breakdown right along with hers. (And, okay, the week I read Part 7 was a bad week.) But I did not expect to feel for her the way that I did, for her thinking to seem so clear and full and sad. Her bitter anger is as frighteningly relatable as her mild denial. The ending is just truly devastating. I cried on my lunch break.
This surprised me, because my reservations about Tolstoy made me suspect that his characters' actions would feel cool and remote, but at least as far as Anna is concerned, this is untrue. Because Tolstoy, surprisingly, gets an awful lot about emotions and relationships with deep accuracy. I underestimated the gentleman. As a great compliment, I found his style reminded me of George Eliot (though in my opinion Eliot is sharper by half). They're interested in the same thing: what happens in a living marriage, and why. How it looks on the outside, what they choose, what they want, and what they don't even realize motivates them. This is as psychologically crisp as my favorite of Eliot's writing, but their authorial perspectives are what differ: according to the Introduction here, Tolstoy seems to have come to care for Anna only reluctantly. (In early drafts, she was even ugly! Gasp!) Insightful is not the same as wise, and I did not believe in Tolstoy's unconditional empathy.
Actually, this book and Middlemarch are even alike in structure. (I just Googled: they were basically published at the exact same time, which is kind of amazing.) Middlemarch's famous double narrative is similarly done with two couples here, though I can't decide if for Tolstoy this is deliberate. It more seems that he just couldn't help writing about Levin, though his book was supposed to be about someone else. It's actually totally amazing that the book isn't named Konstantin Levin, because Levin is the character given all the revelations about life and the world, all the positive growth and changes, all the salvation. Tolstoy wouldn't share a drop of it with Anna, so instead, he invented a character exactly like himself. How much easier it is, to sympathize with yourself!
So no surprise, Levin is a constant pain in the ass. But to give due credit, his weaknesses are as key as his eventual triumphs. Tolstoy may be writing his mirror, but he doesn't spare Levin bucketfuls of foolishness. He is emo and ungenerous and jealous and ignorant, aside from being our moral hero. I suppose this makes him realistic or well-rounded to some readers. It is true; I think everyone knows a Levin. (And he is exhausting.) In the text, his defects are sometimes actually funny, or actually humiliating, and even, sometimes, actually sweet. His relationship with Kitty has some surprisingly affectionate moments and even flirtatious, intimate ones. I rather liked that. UNFORTUNATELY, he is stupid to her way too much, and stupid to the world way too much. His whole thing for the whole book is finding ways of rationalizing his selfishness in lofty, institutional ways.
If the book were taking curtain calls, I guess the next bow would be Vronsky, but I am not terribly interested in Vronsky. (Vronk-a-donk, as I always seem to type it.) Many readers seem to despise him, but really I didn't. He didn't interest me, either. I liked his destructive romantic gestures, for the purposes of the fiction, and the way he ends up. As an individual he didn't matter a lot to me. The same goes for the other men, Karenin and Stiva. They serve their purposes, as Anna's husband and brother. Karenin seems mostly to be there as a stodgy, cross roadblock. Stiva's importance mostly seems to be in the novel's opening, which is concerned with the revelation of his own adultery. Non-spoiler: IT RESOLVES A LITTLE DIFFERENTLY, than it does for his sister.
But there are two more women in the book who set quite deliberate contrasts to Anna. Kitty is frustrating, because while she's genuinely nice, and grows confident and mature through the novel, her personhood is also really thin. Her sister Dolly is a lot more interesting, and when we spent time with her I liked it a lot. Tolstoy has a surprising amount of empathy for the immobility of Dolly's life, with too many children and an undevoted husband, and one of my favorite sections was her visit to Anna, looking in at a different life with a little envy.
I think Tolstoy was pleased to have these women on board, countering Anna's life. It's a bit like his need to have Levin as a second protagonist: he couldn't let her speak for herself. This way is risk-free. If he didn't use the innocent to take focus away, what might readers think? But it profits, in a way, because by and large all of these characters have a psychological realness that is special, whether you like them or not. I don't think Tolstoy's stroke is unequivocally masterful, but he's no dummy. He's interested in people. He's also, though, not above judging them.
Also, Levin's dog gets internal monologue. So silly. \m/
Generally, I had some disappointment in the long scenes after the example set by the early horserace scene. It's such a good way to use this scene -- long in detail, spending a long time in the head of a character, and then a shock of consequences. It throws the character way off, and the reader along a different trajectory, realizing. But it's a bad precedent because later, all kinds of drawn-out things happen, and very little results from them. Things I prayed would have a stunning, emotional outcome include: mowing grass, voting, political discussions.
I would have welcomed a footnote about the titles of the nobility, i.e. wtf everyone's a princess. At first my under-educated western eyes thought, "Oooh, a prince!" But quite soon I changed my tune to, "WHY IS LITERALLY EVERY ONE A PRINCE." Far from being an actual child of the royal leader, you've got princes for miles, as it was a pretty basic title for the aristocracy. Ok. Learned something! But does grow kind of redundant in the text, after a while. I guess I'm just less interested if you're not a special prince.
I am glad that I read the Translator's Note at the front -- though, I confess, I read it after finishing the book. Sidebar: I only read Prefaces or Introductions or what have you at the end. I think because I only read for fun, I really dislike someone telling me about the important scenes before they impress me. Indeed, the ending is utterly apparent on the first page of the Preface in this edition, which would've annoyed me hugely. I knew I wanted the moment to come out just as written by the author, not by a scholar.
Anyway, the Translator's Note explains something that, ignorantly, I'd thought was careless translation: Tolstoy wrote in a way that uses Russian words repetitively, and Pevear & Volokhonsky made a choice to emulate this with English. I'm not certain that it sounds less redundant in the original, but at times some sentences here do. It's slightly distracting, but at least is more enigmatic as a deliberate choice. Overall, I enjoyed the reading a lot, and it's a really pleasant translation.
And may I have a prize because I never got confused about who anybody was no matter how many names they got called, people!
So. Which one next year?
I really like this thing where I hit one epic per summer off the "before I die" list. Anna Karenina isn't something I'd have decided to read right now if a friend hadn't suggested we try it, but if not now, when? (drea warned: "There is probably not a lot about sperm." Glory be.)
It's true that calling this book Anna Karenina is like calling Middlemarch "Dorothea Brooke." (Dorothea at least shows up before page 50 of her book.) It isn't a book about her, but her story is its strongest beat. The way she changes and the things that happen to her are the most interesting. And it is, in my opinion, legitimately romantic. When she and Vronksy come together there is a table-sweeping feeling that is both fantasy and real. From the first,
Spoiler
when Vronsky follows her to Petersburg and presents himself at the train station,Spoiler
I was so happy, throughout, that they stayed in love. A hundred misunderstandings could've driven them apart, but that is not the way it ultimately comes about. The way they end up on the wrong page is not petty.Spoiler
Probably the scholarly, interesting thing here is noticing that Anna's un-marriage makes her unhappy as well as the marriage she left. Of course, she is being thematically punished, too, Bovary-style. But she is ultimately no freer this way.This surprised me, because my reservations about Tolstoy made me suspect that his characters' actions would feel cool and remote, but at least as far as Anna is concerned, this is untrue. Because Tolstoy, surprisingly, gets an awful lot about emotions and relationships with deep accuracy. I underestimated the gentleman. As a great compliment, I found his style reminded me of George Eliot (though in my opinion Eliot is sharper by half). They're interested in the same thing: what happens in a living marriage, and why. How it looks on the outside, what they choose, what they want, and what they don't even realize motivates them. This is as psychologically crisp as my favorite of Eliot's writing, but their authorial perspectives are what differ: according to the Introduction here, Tolstoy seems to have come to care for Anna only reluctantly. (In early drafts, she was even ugly! Gasp!) Insightful is not the same as wise, and I did not believe in Tolstoy's unconditional empathy.
Actually, this book and Middlemarch are even alike in structure. (I just Googled: they were basically published at the exact same time, which is kind of amazing.) Middlemarch's famous double narrative is similarly done with two couples here, though I can't decide if for Tolstoy this is deliberate. It more seems that he just couldn't help writing about Levin, though his book was supposed to be about someone else. It's actually totally amazing that the book isn't named Konstantin Levin, because Levin is the character given all the revelations about life and the world, all the positive growth and changes, all the salvation. Tolstoy wouldn't share a drop of it with Anna, so instead, he invented a character exactly like himself. How much easier it is, to sympathize with yourself!
So no surprise, Levin is a constant pain in the ass. But to give due credit, his weaknesses are as key as his eventual triumphs. Tolstoy may be writing his mirror, but he doesn't spare Levin bucketfuls of foolishness. He is emo and ungenerous and jealous and ignorant, aside from being our moral hero. I suppose this makes him realistic or well-rounded to some readers. It is true; I think everyone knows a Levin. (And he is exhausting.) In the text, his defects are sometimes actually funny, or actually humiliating, and even, sometimes, actually sweet. His relationship with Kitty has some surprisingly affectionate moments and even flirtatious, intimate ones
Spoiler
(when she BITES HIS FINGER OMG ha ha)Spoiler
In the end, Tolstoy writes him a grand change of heart, but one that mysteriously sounds... exactly like his previous state of heart, only with God in. Talk about the ultimate self-exculpation.If the book were taking curtain calls, I guess the next bow would be Vronsky, but I am not terribly interested in Vronsky. (Vronk-a-donk, as I always seem to type it.) Many readers seem to despise him, but really I didn't. He didn't interest me, either. I liked his destructive romantic gestures, for the purposes of the fiction, and the way he ends up. As an individual he didn't matter a lot to me. The same goes for the other men, Karenin and Stiva. They serve their purposes, as Anna's husband and brother. Karenin seems mostly to be there as a stodgy, cross roadblock. Stiva's importance mostly seems to be in the novel's opening, which is concerned with the revelation of his own adultery. Non-spoiler: IT RESOLVES A LITTLE DIFFERENTLY, than it does for his sister.
But there are two more women in the book who set quite deliberate contrasts to Anna. Kitty is frustrating, because while she's genuinely nice, and grows confident and mature through the novel, her personhood is also really thin.
Spoiler
Tolstoy basically pushes the "marriage has perfected my life" button for the rest of her characterization. She is a perfect wife; she is made wise by the mysteries of childbearing; she is then a perfect mother. That's not a real character, and her unimportance is proven when multiple mentions are made of a postpartum illness that we do not see at all. When was that? Was it serious? Doesn't matter.Spoiler
She feels inadequate and uncool, and like she has to fake having fun with the rich people, but is warm to Anna until she reveals something personal to Dolly. Oddly, it's birth control, which Dolly has never heard of, and which sets her world a bit upside down. To cover her regret, she 180s to disapprove Anna's unnatural life.I think Tolstoy was pleased to have these women on board, countering Anna's life. It's a bit like his need to have Levin as a second protagonist: he couldn't let her speak for herself. This way is risk-free. If he didn't use the innocent to take focus away, what might readers think? But it profits, in a way, because by and large all of these characters have a psychological realness that is special, whether you like them or not. I don't think Tolstoy's stroke is unequivocally masterful, but he's no dummy. He's interested in people. He's also, though, not above judging them.
Also, Levin's dog gets internal monologue. So silly. \m/
Generally, I had some disappointment in the long scenes after the example set by the early horserace scene.
Spoiler
That scene is so long, and I thought dull, and then it ends so unexpectedly with a horrible mistake that breaks a horse's back, and it's shot.I would have welcomed a footnote about the titles of the nobility, i.e. wtf everyone's a princess. At first my under-educated western eyes thought, "Oooh, a prince!" But quite soon I changed my tune to, "WHY IS LITERALLY EVERY ONE A PRINCE." Far from being an actual child of the royal leader, you've got princes for miles, as it was a pretty basic title for the aristocracy. Ok. Learned something! But does grow kind of redundant in the text, after a while. I guess I'm just less interested if you're not a special prince.
I am glad that I read the Translator's Note at the front -- though, I confess, I read it after finishing the book. Sidebar: I only read Prefaces or Introductions or what have you at the end. I think because I only read for fun, I really dislike someone telling me about the important scenes before they impress me. Indeed, the ending is utterly apparent on the first page of the Preface in this edition, which would've annoyed me hugely.
Spoiler
Of course I knew an outline -- pretty sure she dies, I think it's suicide, I think there's a train, butAnyway, the Translator's Note explains something that, ignorantly, I'd thought was careless translation: Tolstoy wrote in a way that uses Russian words repetitively, and Pevear & Volokhonsky made a choice to emulate this with English. I'm not certain that it sounds less redundant in the original, but at times some sentences here do. It's slightly distracting, but at least is more enigmatic as a deliberate choice. Overall, I enjoyed the reading a lot, and it's a really pleasant translation.
And may I have a prize because I never got confused about who anybody was no matter how many names they got called, people!
So. Which one next year?