Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
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Book Reviews of Anna Karenina
Book Review: Marathon Books Worth Reading
Summary: 5 Stars
A "marathon book" is a book that is not only going to take a lot of time for you to read, but it is also a book that will force you to exit yourself and enter a new way of thinking. You will have to accept new rules, new scenarios, new kinds of motives. "Anna Karenina" is a book of stories intertwined. The characters are real to the point that we must live with them throughout the events of their lives.Anna is comfortable in a marriage to a man she does not love. She has a son and he is singly her whole life. A nobleman soons falls in love with her and pursues her until he convinces her to become his lover.This is just the beginning and I must not say much more for fear that I will spoil it for you.
I recommend this book. Like the other great "marathon books" ie: "moby dick", "lucky monkeys in the sky", "war and peace", etc., "Anna" will not only engross you, it will devour you for the time and feeling you devote to it. Like "lucky monkeys in the sky" and the other forementioned novels, "Anna" carries the themes: fate,death, the meaning of life, and faith. You will most likely love it or hate it, but, most of all, you will think. In the end, I believe, it will be a devotion well worth the time.
Book Review: The greatest romance of them all
Summary: 5 Stars
Who would have thought this novel would soar to the top of the amazon charts? Certainly not the translators, Pevear and Volokhonsky, who were shocked to hear their edition had been selected for Oprah's Book Club. It is great boon for them and the novel as well, which might be regarded as the godmother of the modern romance novel. Tolstoy weaves a magic web, bringing together dysfunctional aristocratic families in perhaps the most memorable Russian novel.
This translation brings the story to life for the non-Russian speaker. Pevear and Volokhonsky have made a habit out of translating Russian novels, from Gogol to Dostoevsky, and now are even tackling Tolstoy's epic work, War and Peace. The language is modern yet true to the Russian original, thanks in large part to Ms. Volokhonsky who is a native Russian speaker.
The story itself has been told so many times before that it doesn't need repeating. But for those who would like a little more insight into the novel, I would suggest reading Nabokov's chapter on Anna Karenina in his Lectures on Russian Literature, as he provides many valuable references over and above those provided by Pevear and Volokhonsky.
Book Review: This is no ordinary adultery tale
Summary: 5 Stars
Leo Tolstoy came from the didactic moral school of writing. Although he believed that immoral subject-matter could be written about, he thought it should be done with a moral goal or moral purpose--for example, showing the negative effects of adultery, and punishing the immoral behavior in the story or ending with bad consequences happening as a result. There is absolutely nothing original about this story premise of the empty woman who has everything but not love, and because she is dissatisfied with her marriage, she falls for the handsome Count Vronsky. But even though the premise is a very familiar one that had already been done by many authors time and time again, Tolstoy's talent covers it with a depth and freshness that makes this one of the most powerful novels of the 19th century. Anna is a good, moral woman, but she simply cannot resist, is not strong enough to resist, this tragic dangerous romantic temptation of the persistent count. The reader will not condone, but will sympathize. The ending was in line with Tolstoy's moralistic philosophy (bad behavior is punished), but that makes it no less powerful and moving.David Rehak
author of "Love and Madness"
Book Review: The greatest romance of them all.
Summary: 5 Stars
Who would have thought this novel would soar to the top of the amazon charts? Certainly not the translators, Pevear and Volokhonsky, who were shocked to hear their edition had been selected for Oprah's Book Club. It is great boon for them and the novel as well, which might be regarded as the godmother of the modern romance novel. Tolstoy weaves a magic web, bringing together dysfunctional aristocratic families in perhaps the most memorable Russian novel. This translation brings the story to life for the non-Russian speaker. Pevear and Volokhonsky have made a habit out of translating Russian novels, from Gogol to Dostoevsky, and now are even tackling Tolstoy's epic work, War and Peace. The language is modern yet true to the Russian original, thanks in large part to Ms. Volokhonsky who is a native Russian speaker.
The story itself has been told so many times before that it doesn't need repeating. But for those who would like a little more insight into the novel, I would suggest reading Nabokov's chapter on Anna Karenina in his Lectures on Russian Literature, as he provides many valuable references over and above those provided by Pevear and Volokhonsky.
Book Review: Men are from Mars ....
Summary: 5 Stars
I will not repeat what many other reviewers have already stated. If you are a fan of authors who build their characters in detailed layers and provide you with enough information to give you a feel for the age and place that they are writing about, you will enjoy this book immensely. If, on the other hand, you like only lots of action, quick detailed plot shifts and so forth, you will have trouble making it through this book.
Those that criticize this book seem to judge the book from a 21st century perspective where we are entertained by 23-minute television shows (sans commercials) and, at most, two-hour movies. Having been written in the 1870's, the book is an example of the pinnacle of entertainment for that era.
Most of all the book struck me as a study of the relationship between men and women in late 1800's Russian upper crust culture. Many of the themes are still relevant today. Tolstoy's romantic novel introspectively details the different way men and woman can look at the same circumstances and come to very different conclusions. It is a fascinating study of those relationships that made the book so interesting to me.