TOLSTOY

Henri Troy at

The task of writing a biography on a subjcct as monumentally eomplex as Leo Tolstoy demands of an author a combination of talents almost Tol- stoyan in breadth and scope. Henri Troyat is such an author, and this biography of Tolstoy, says Genet in The New Yorker, "is at last the final, complete portrait of the man as he surely was."

Under M. Troyat's guidance, one is led to understand why Tolstoy is considered one of the most bizarre personalities of modern times; why he was regarded by his contemporaries not only as a literary giant but also as a gargantuan enigma. Tolstoy fascinated the people of his own time. In these pages, that fascination is reborn in the story of a man who was the personification of Man at all times, who was in reality two men, "one saint, the other a libertine —clothed in the same skin and constantly at war." Troyat views Tolstoy with affection, respect, and often with amusement. For as a writer, lover, husband, father, and cult leader, this extraordinary human being was a mass of contradictions. He was a man

(Continued on back flap)

Book Club 054 Edition

Tolstoy

Also by I lenri Troyat

(Published in English)

Fiction

ONE MINUS TWO JUDITH MADRIER MOUNTAIN

WHILE THE EARTH ENDURES MY FATHER'S HOUSE THE RED AND THE WHITE STRANGERS ON THE EARTH THE SEED AND THE FRUIT AMELIE IN LOVE AMELIE AND PIERRF. ELIZABETH

TENDER AND VIOLENT ELIZABETH THE ENCOUNTER THE LIGHT OF THE JUST

BROTHERHOOD OF THE RED POPPY THE BARONESS EXTREME FRIENDSHIP

Non-Fiction

FIREBRAND: THE LIFE OF DOSTOYEVSKY PUSHKIN: A BIOGRAPHY

DAILY LIFE IN RUSSIA UNDER THE LAST TSAR

 

Leo Tolstoy at the time he was writing War and Peace (i868)

by H enri Troyat

Translated from the French by Nancy Amphoux

Doubleday <5> Company, Inc. Garden City, New York

Tolstoi was published in France by Librairic Arthcmc Fayard in 1965

Copyright © 1967 by Doubleday & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved Printed in the United States of America

Contents

PART I. THE TERMS OF THE PROBLEM

Before Leo Tolstoy 3

Childhood 14

The World Outside 25

Kazan 41

Wild Oats 55

PART II. A TIME OF VIOLENCE

The Caucasus 77

Sevastopol 109

Introduction to Civilian Life 132

PART III. TRAVEL, ROMANCE AND PEDAGOGY

Discovery of Europe 169

A Few False Starts 187

Second Trip Abroad 205

"Arbiter of the Peace" and Schoolmaster 219

PART IV. SONYA

Betrothal 243

A Terrifying Happiness 266

The Great Labor 286

War and Peace 314

The Night at Arzamas 332

PART V. CONFLICT

Interim 341

Anna Karenina 376

Art and Faith 391

The Horrors of the City; the Appeal of the "Dark Ones" 435

PART VI. Tnis LOATnSOME FLESH . . .

The Temptation of Sainthood 461

The Kreutzer Sonata 488

Famine and Strife 510

Sonya's Folly; What Is Art? 536

PART VII. THE APOSTLE OF NON-VIOLENCE

Resurrection; the Dukhobors 561

Excommunication; the Crimea 584

The Russo-Japanese War 613

PART VIII. THE SOLUTION

Days Pass, and a Birthday 629

Re-enter Chertkov 646

Last Will and Testament 668

Flight 699 Post Mortem 730

APPENDICES

Biographical Notes 735

Notes to the Text 745

Bibliography 768

Index 774

ILLUSTRATIONS

Frontispiece. Leo Tolstoy at the time he was working on War and Peace (1868). Novosti Press Agency

Nicholas Tolstoy, father of Leo Tolstoy. Bibliothdque

Nationale, Paris

Tolstoy as a student. Bibliothdque Nationale, Paris

Tolstoy and his three brothers. Pushkin House, Lenin

grad

Leo Tolstoy, 1856. Bibliothdque Nationale, Paris

Sofya Behrs. Schnapp, Institut d'Etudes Slaves, Paris

Tolstoy and his wife, Sofya, 1881. Roger Jean Segalat

Tolstoy and his family, 1887

The house at Yasnaya Polyana

Ivan S. Turgenev. Novosti Press Agency

A galley proof of Resurrection, corrected by the author

Tolstoy and his daughter Alexandra. Bibliothdque Na

tionale, Paris

Tolstoy and Anton Chekhov. Bibliothdque Nationale,

Paris

Tolstoy and Maxim Gorky. Bibliothdque Nationale,

Paris

Tolstoy and his daughter Tatyana. Bureau of Soviet

Information, Paris

Tolstoy at his worktablc

Tolstoy telling a story to two of his grandchildren.

Giraudon

Tolstoy, Chertkov and a group of Tolstoyans. Institut

d'Etudes Slaves, Paris

Tolstoy at Yasnaya Polyana, 1908. V. G. Chertkov

Tolstoy playing chess. Novosti Press Agency

Tolstoy on his birthday, 1908. K. Boulla, Novosti Press

Agency

Tolstoy and Dr. Makovitsky. Bureau of Soviet Informa

tion, Paris

Tolstoy as a pilgrim. Nahinias, Institut (TEtudes Slaves,

Paris

The room in which Tolstoy died

Tolstoy's grave at Yasnaya Polyana. V. Malychev, Bureau

of Soviet Information, Paris

PART I

Terms of the Problem

1. Before Leo Tolstoy

Napoleon and Alexander I might exchange sociable letters or recall their ambassadors, promise their peoples peace or plunge them into war, sacrifice thousands of soldiers at Eylau or embrace at Tilsit; but old Prince Nicholas Sergeyevich Volkonsky, who had been living in retirement on his family estate of Yasnaya Polyana since 1800, turned a deaf ear to the clamor of a world in which he 110 longer had a place. No one knew quite why he had suddenly withdrawn from public life. Some of the people who knew him best intimated that he had too much character to remain in the shadow of the throne: years before, he had refused to marry young Varenka Engelhardt, niece—and mistress—of Potemkin, the dreaded favorite of Catherine II, with the comment, "Whatever possessed him to imagine that I would marry his whore?" Yet, despite this arrogant retort, or perhaps because of it, the empress had favored him. Appointed captain in the Guards, he accompanied her to Mogilev to meet Joseph II of Austria. Then, rising swiftly through the ranks, he became ambassador extraordinary to the king of Prussia, commander of the Azov Musketeers, and finally general and military governor of Arkhangelsk, on the shores of the White Sea. This little-to-be-envicd post in a glacial climate had been conferred upon him by Tsar Paul I, who succeeded Catherine the Great, but whether as a mark of special favor or disgrace it was impossible to tell. In any event, Prince Volkonsky wasted no time in coming to blows with his new sovereign, whose splenetic and capricious temperament had already terrified all Russia. When, after some trivial professional incident, he received a letter from the emperor omitting the traditional "I remain your benevolent sovereign" at the bottom of the page, he surmised that his career was at an end and, taking the initiative, quickly asked to be relieved of active duty.

Oncc settled at Yasnaya Polyana,^- this cultivated, dynamic and fiercely proud man resolved never to set foot outside it again. lie liked to say that he needed nobody and nothing and that anyone who wanted to sec him could make the trip, as his estate was only one hundred and thirty miles from Moscow.t Often, as though to convince himself of his own importance, he shut himself up in his sitting room to pore over his family tree. Hie trunk, from which serpentine limbs curlcd out laden with illustrious names, was held by St. Michael, prince of Chernigov. According to this document, the Volkonskys descended from the famous Prince Rurik, one of whose offspring had been given a holding, in the fourteenth century', in the government of Tula on the banks of the Volkona River. One Prince Volkonsky (Fyodor Ivano- vich) died a hero at the battle of Kulikovo, in the war of independence with the Tatars of the Golden Horde; another (Sergey Fyodorovich) was a general in the Seven Years' War, and would have been killed but for a little icon he wore around his neck, which stopped the enemy shell.¹

In recognition of the services rendered to the State by tin's great family, Prince Nicholas Sergeyevich Volkonsky had been granted the privilege of keeping two armed sentinels at Yasnaya Polyana. Day and night they paced back and forth in their shabby uniforms, guns over their left shoulders and shakos askew, between the two little towers of whitewashed brick, topped by buckler-shaped roofs, which flanked the entrance to the estate. Peasants and tradesmen, and even honored guests, were reminded by these soldiers that although the master of the house had withdrawn from the world and was no longer influential at court, all in the government of Tula owed him their respect. His serfs loved and feared him. He gave them advice on cultivating the land and saw that they were decently housed, fed and clothcd; lie shielded them from badgering by the provincial administrative authorities, and organized festivities for them. His severity was proverbial, but his muzhiks were never beaten. At seven o'clock every morning, eight serf-musicians in wide blouses, breeches, white stockings and pumps would assemble in front of their music stands near an ancient elm. A little boy would cry out, "He's awake!" as he went by carrying a pitcher of hot water. Thereupon the orchestra tuned up, and the opening chords of a Haydn symphony rose to the windows of the princely bed-

• The Russian word yasny means "luminous" or "clear" and yasen is an ash tree, so some translate Yasnaya Polyana by "Clear Glade" and others, less poetic but closer to the tnith, bv "Ash Glade."

t One hundred and ninety-six vcrsts. One verst equals 3500 feet, or approximately .66