LEO TOLSTOY AND ENGLISH FAMILY NOVEL: CONTINUITY AND CONTROVERSY. LEO TOLSTOY AND ENGLISH FAMILY NOVEL

In this article the family theme of Tolstoy’s novels is compared with the one of novels of his English contemporary authors. The problems of the novel “Anna Karenina” looks like the problems of the English novels, but is solved quite different. If the heroes of English novels drive from the foreign terrible world to the comfortable home world, then the heroes of Tolstoy novels are attacked by an alien force, destroying their happiness.

The Reasons for the “Non-meeting” of F.M. Dostoevsky and Leo Tolstoy

The well-known historical and literary paradox is considered again: the contemporaries F.M. Dostoevsky and L.N. Tolstoy were not personally acquainted, although they had the opportunity to do so more than once. The assumption is substantiated that the main reason for such a non-meeting was not only a combination of random circumstances, but also the incredible intuition of both writers: constantly reading each other, feeling the deepest spiritual closeness and understanding the mutual significance for literature and society, both avoided everyday meetings even on literary occasions, because they were afraid that a possible verbal discussion would lead to an involuntary, even temporary profanation of their views.

The Kreutzer Sonata

Women's inferiority persists, particularly in patriarchal societies. In Russia, women have always been treated as second-class citize (Placeholder1)ns to men. As a result, because it is a system that already exists in society, women's inferiority is the fundamental problem of inequality for women in Russia. The novel The Kreutzer Sonata explores the inferiority of female characters in nineteenth-century Russia, where the church's influence is still strong. The aims of the research were to examine about women inferiority and struggle in patriarchal society as portrayed in the novel The Kreutzer Sonata by Leo Tolstoy. The data was collected using the following methods: 1) attentively reading the novel to determine which sections featured inferiority and struggle, and 2) collecting notes and marking the facts of inferiority in the marriage and society. 3) categorizing; and 4) analyzing. Based on the research, it was discovered that there were two major forms of women's inferiority: 1) the feeling of powerlessness in decision of marriages. This powerlessness happens to both the mother and the daughters. 2) being subjected to discriminatory treatment, such as a lack of freedom and mobility based only on sexuality, as well as physical abuse and loss of inheritance.

The Eastern Plot of L.N. Tolstoy

The article considers the development of the concept of the Caucasian peoples in the works of Leo Tolstoy: from the depiction of the Highlanders as natural, somewhat idealized types ("Cossacks") to the affirmation of their universal human nature ("Caucasian prisoner") and the return to the novel type of a person in whose fate the most important features of Russian life of the late XIX century were reflected. (“Hadji Murad”).

The epistolary heritage of Leo Tolstoy at the turn of the XIX–XX centuries: the motive of reading in the estate

Based on the analysis of the letters of Leo Tolstoy 1890–1910 the article analyzes the motive for reading, which is directly related to the estate life. The epistolary heritage of the writer has not yet been fully investigated, and in the study of the estate theme in the work of the late Tolstoy, it plays an important role. Typical for the late XIX — early XX centuries the process of impoverishment of noble estates at this time almost did not touch Yasnaya Polyana. While Tolstoy was alive, his estate remained a kind of energy center. Tolstoy's statements about the works he read in letters make it possible to estimate the volume of his reading, the literature he preferred. The author of the article selected illustrative examples from Tolstoy’s letters with a polar assessment of the works of various writers. The author analyzes the direct messages of the writer about reading as a pastime, hobby, realized mainly in letters to close people: stories about home reading, about the impressions of books. Special attention is paid to reading as the basis for the moral formation of a person and his spiritual growth, as well as the choice of books, the study of which was of decisive importance for the further course of Tolstoy's thought and the direction of his artistic and journalistic work. The article comprehends the role of Tolstoy as a key figure in the literary process at the turn of the century, evaluates its manifestations in the writer’s epistolary heritage.

Semiotic and linguistic analysis of The Leap by Leo Tolstoy

The paper is concerned with the referential, lexical, pragmatic, semiotic, and literary analysis of Leo Tolstoy’s tale entitled The Leap in the context of his own life, as well as of his standpoint on Charles Darwin’s evolution theory.

SECONDARY THEATRE TEXTS TO THE DEVIL BY LEO TOLSTOY

В статье рассматривается рецепция повести Л.Н. Толстого «Дьявол» в двух театральных постановках: «Дьявол» (Московский театр Олега Табакова) и «История страсти» (Вышневолоцкий областной драматический театр). Разница интерпретаций определяется постмодернистской децентрацией смысла в первом случае и конгениальным прочтением толстовского текста - во втором. The article deals with the reception of Leo Tolstoy’s novella The Devil in the two theatrical productions: The Devil (Oleg Tabakov Theatre, Moscow) and The Story of Passion (Vyshny Volochyok Regional Drama Theatre). The difference in interpretation is determined by the postmodern decentering of meaning in the first case and by the congenial reading of Tolstoy’s text in the second one.

The influence of Leo Tolstoy on the work of european writers from the standpoint of developing family themes

The family theme permeates the work of the three titans of literature - Leo Tolstoy, Hervé Bazin and John Galsworthy. As is well known, these are great representatives of different generations and nationalities. The importance of the problem statement is self-evident; it is included in the register of the so-called "eternal plots". The institution of marriage and family, as well as issues of the extinction of love and the identification of the causes of the breakdown of relationships, will draw attention to themselves as long as humanity is alive. The family theme in the work of Leo Tolstoy is so voluminous, and the breadth of conclusions and generalizations in the work is so deep that it is fundamentally impossible to fit it into the framework of one article. Therefore, we limited ourselves to the most striking examples from Tolstoy's "flash fiction". To complete the picture, we pointed to the creative borrowing of a number of Tolstoy's ideas in the family epic sagas of Bazin and Galsworthy.

Two Tolstoys and a Lenin—Temperance and Prohibition in Russia

Part I of the book—covering Europe’s continental empires—begins with Chapter 2 on the Russian Empire. The state’s overreliance on revenues from the imperial vodka monopoly is laid bare beginning with the temperance revolts of the 1850s, when the empire was almost bankrupted when peasants refused to drink. The understanding of temperance as opposition to imperial autocracy is traced through the antistatist teachings of Leo Tolstoy and early Bolsheviks, including the prohibitionists Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky. Despite official opposition to “subversive” temperance activism, at the outbreak of World War I in 1914 Tsar Nicholas II made Russia the first prohibitionist state, though the loss of state revenue paved the way for the revolutions of 1917. Lenin maintained a prohibition against the vodka trade, which was only undone after Lenin’s death by Joseph Stalin, who reintroduced the tsarist-era vodka monopoly in the interests of state finance.