LEV TOLSTOY<
BR> (1828-1910)
Lev Tolstoy was a Russian writer, novelist, essayist, activist, philosopher and educational reformer.He was the most influential member of the aristocratic Tolstoy
family.He was born August 28, 1828, on his father''s estate of Yasnaya Polyana, in the Tula gubernya of Central Russia.The Tolstoys are a well known family of old Russian nobility , the writer;s mother was born a Princess Volkonsky , while his grandmothers came from the Troubetzkoy and Gorchakov princly families.Tolsoy was connected to the grandest family of Russian aristocracy:Alexander Pushkin was his fourth cousin.His parents both died before he reached the age of ten and his relatives who raised him, especially his aunt Madame Ergolsky, educated him at home.
In 1844, Tolstoy began studying law and Oriental languages at Kazan University, but he found no meaning in further studies and left the university in the middle of a term.In 1849, he settled down at Yasnaya Polyana , where he attempted to be useful to his
peasants , but soon he discovered the ineffectivness of his uninformed zeal.Tolstoy ended up joing the military seeing action in the Crimean war that inspired "Sevastopol"(1855), "The Cossacks"(1861)and "The Raid"(!852) .After his military service , he travelled in Europe and in 1862 he married Sofia Bers , with whom he had 13
children.
In 1859 he started a school for peasant children at Yasnaya Polyana, followed by 12 others.He also authored a great number of stories for peasant children.
Tolstoy''s first publications were three autobiographical novels "Childhood", "Boyhood" and "Youth"(1852-1856).They tell of a rich landowners ''s son and his slow realization of the differences between him and his peasants.He is most well remembered for his voluminous "War and Peace", published serially in the 1860s.Its vast canvas includes 580 characters , many historical , others fictional.The story moves from family life to the headquarters of Napoleon , from the court of Alexander I of Russia to the sattlefields of Austerlitz and Borodino.The
novel explores Tolstoy''s theory of history , and in particular the insignificance of individuals such as Napoleon and Alexander.Tolstoy''s imagination created a world that seems to be so believale , so real, that is not easy to realize that most of his characters actually never existed and that Tolstoy never witnessed the epoch described in the novel.In 1877 he wrote the novel "Ana Karenina", where he tells paralell stories of an adulterous woman trapped by the conventions and falsities of society and of a philosophical landowner who works alonside the peasants in the fields and seeks to reform their lives.His last novel was "Resurrection", published in 1899, which told the story of a nobleman seeking redemption for a sin committed years earlier and incorporated many of Tolstoy''s refashioned views on life.
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