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Summary: The complex conflicts of society and the conscience.
Review: Tolstoy's Anna Karenina is undoubtedly one of the greatest works of literature ever written. It is by no means a "light book" or an "easy read." As the reader diligently reads through this voluminous, 800 plus page, novel they live and experience the struggles of the characters. The novel centers on the two contrasting yet interwoven plots of the honest, loving and faithful relationship of Princess Kitty and Constanine Levin contrasted against the socially and morally condemned adulterous love affair of Anna Karenina and Count Vronsky. The novel's epigraph "Vengeance is mine, I shall repay; saith the Lord" alludes to the novel's theme of divine retribution, where the choices and actions made by the characters are either rewarded or punished by God. Anna Karenina is not a victim of fate or destiny but of her own selfishness and dishonesty to herself and others which leads to her eventual demise. Kitty and Levin are rewarded with happiness and a successful marriage because of their honesty and unselfish love. Anna Karenina delves not only into the human conscience but also into the conscience of Russian society; it is also full of symbolism for example Vronsky's tragic horse race, which symbolizes his part in Anna's destruction. As I read through all of the reviews I noticed that an important issue was neglected even from the review written by the publisher and that is that Levin is a partial autobiography by Tolstoy. Levin's strong inner conflicts, agnosticism and search for meaning in life was a reflection of Tolsoy's own beliefs. I wrote a term paper on Anna Karenina and through all the reading, research and time I put in paid off immensely and not just in terms of the grade. Although I at times resented Anna for her selfishness I could empathize with her struggle for independence which she never achieves. I cried when she killed herself yet hated her for this final act of selfness. This novel is a complex weaving of characters, emotions, and struggles but in the end the reader is rewarded by Tolstoy's pure genius.
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Summary: The People vs. Anna Karenina (and her "too too solid flesh")
Review: I. I read Anna 17 years ago, as a young man barely out of high school. It was perhaps the first book I attempted to sit down and read seriously, and with full attention, after my disastrous introduction to literature by my well-intentioned high school English teachers. I was immediately fascinated, and fell in love with her as a type with whom I was already even then familiar... II. Whenever I read a book, I always try to remember at least one main idea: what the book signified to me, personally. For example, in Turgenev's Fathers & Sons, (more correctly Fathers & Children as a Russian acquaintance informs me), the moral for me is that there is a chasm between the generations which love can attempt to bridge, but never can quite successfully span. (One remarks this in one's own family as the years pass, by the way...) In Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment, the moral for me has been that there is a line which a man dare not cross,- that we attempt to override our inner emotional (and moral) framework, by means of intellectual theories, at our own peril. Tolstoy's works have always been so memorable for me, or at least parts of them, that my mind refuses to approach them in this sort of bookkeeping manner. III. What, then, IS important about this story, and what should we say for those who might consider reading it? This story is certainly a mighty example of what in Japan is referred to as the giri-ninjo conflict: the conflict of personal feeling with duty. In traditional Japanese literature, for example, the respectable family man finds himself in passionate love with a geisha; unable to resolve the psychological tension in a society which provided no outlet for this sort of disruptive manifestation of raw id power, they commit suicide together. As Garrison Keillor once put it, "the great martyrs went to their martyrdom alone; they didn't take their wives [or husbands] with them." The novel certainly reflects the spiritual power of Tolstoy's character, and could certainly be taken as his representative work. For me, perhaps the central lesson of Anna was, and still is, that we cannot divorce ourselves from our inner need to exist in a society wherein we are able to participate and contribute in a genuine and meaningful way. Why is this? The terror of such a work is that we all of us underestimate the counter-reaction provoked by our attempts to move counter to the trend of our culture and our own lifetime of habits: the heroine finds herself alone, without the requisite strength and self-knowledge to protect herself from the destructive elements set loose within her own psyche. (In this regard, one is reminded of Gretschen's guilt-torment in Goethe's Faust after surrendering herself romantically to Faust's lust for her. Also, Anna illustrates Joseph Campbell's idea of the hero cycle: having moved out of the circle of one's knowledges, one enters the field of the unconscious: in this case, the hero proves unworthy, and is devoured by her own powerful unconscious energies: she degenerates into suspicion, sloth and jealousy exacerbated by drug use. A schizophrenic crack-up?) Anna is tragedy; a beautiful young mother and woman crushed against the wandering rocks of social duty evokes such pity and terror within us, that we feel ourselves lifted up and more appreciative of the precious frailty of life. IV. But, my question now, 17 years later, is: aren't we better off that such stories CANNOT now be written, as one amazon reviewer was remarking? Personally, the whole notion that a woman MUST be married to a man for whom she feels no genuine love to be able to function with a clear conscience in society is abhorrent. "The good ol' days", as Bruno Bettelheim once observed, "were not so good anyway". If much has been lost in the mass culture of the 20th century, much too has been gained. The Annas of today divorce their unaffectionate husbands, get custody of their children, marry their Vronskys, and become aerobics instructors or medical transcriptionists. It isn't tragedy, but it is human... V. If you do decide to read Anna, do yourself the favor of finding a good translation, (my favorite is by Constance Garnett), and taking the time to savor each chapter. The effort will reward you as time goes by... VI. "Vengeance is mine; I will repay". I hope that the book is not simple morality play, i.e. the naughty Anna has been rightly chastised for her adultery. My impression was that Anna was a woman, very much alive, who sought true love, and had the courage to try to live meaningfully. She "followed her bliss", as Joseph Campbell puts it, and society pulverized her for it...It is perhaps no coincidence, (and prophetic of Tolstoy), that the society which brought her down was itself destroyed two generations later in the Russian Revoution
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Summary: Worth the effort
Review: The nearly unanimous entusiasm of a century of reviewers, academics, and general readers needs little addition from me. I write only to say that, although this is a massive book, it constantly rewards the reader. No one should be scared of the effort.
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Summary: self-centered
Review: Marvelous work exemplifying the self-destructiveness of self-centeredness. Anna was stubbornly & willfully selfish while believing she had encountered the greatest love of her life - and she had, but not Vronsky, it was her own selfish desire for pleasure and her own way, which destroyed every thing that is truly worth having - honour and self-worth. A life lesson.
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Summary: Anna Karenina was not a weak woman.
Review: I read Anna Karenina last year. It took some time, actually a long time as I read it purely for pleasure and wanted it to last as long as possible. I write this because of the review that I just read calling Anna "weak and confused" and in the very next breath calling Karenin a great character. Surely whoever wrote this is dillusional. Anna was faced with the most difficult decision that a woman in 18th century Russia could have faced- stay married to a shell of a man who lacked even a personality or follow her passion. She is surely not weak or else she would have stayed put instead of breaking the customs of her time. She is the most defiant, strong-will and passionate female character ever to come to life in a work of fiction. A novel like this can not even be written in the modern world because love as the center of a novel is old news and lacks originality. On certain days when I am waiting for the subway to appear from its black hole, I think of Anna when she was waiting for her train, and as the subway speeds by me, I picture myself flying in front of it and being smashed into bits beneath its wheels just as Anna was. If she is weak then no one is brave.
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Summary: Beware: Soap Opera Land
Review: Although I loved the prose of Anna Karenina, I'm just not the "soap opera" type and this one was a doozy set in 18th century Russia. I really learned to hate our supposed "heroine" Anna. She struck me as weak and confused (as were all the women in the novel) who had no clue about playing hard-to-get . And Vronsky, he was just a jerk - a superficial, immature, playboy aristocrat whom you just wanted to slap. Anna's obsession with him completely mystified me. I do have to say that there were some great characters such as Levin and Karenina. So, you probably think I hated this book, but in reality, I loved it! I got so involved with the story, Anna's stupid decisions completely pissed me off and I took her actions at the end of the novel personally. Besides, the language in this novel and the way Tolstoy describes artistocratic life during that era (I wish I had as much time on my hands as those people) was absolutely gorgeous. It's definitely a must-read but "THE GREATEST NOVEL EVER WRITTEN IN HISTORY!" (as everyone says) is a little much
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Summary: The best book EVER!
Review: Anna Karenina is the most believable and empathetic female character ever created.
Tolstoy, as always, creates a complicated world of many different seductive love stories and life-stories, all of which are woven beautifully together through Anna's eyes.
The plot of _Anna Karenina_ is one that remains remarkably current, even in our changing world and distinct culture (from that of Tolstoy's turn-of-the-century Russia). More than just a classic tale though, Anna is a classic character- one whom every woman can identify
with on some level. Tolstoy is a genius for being able to appropriate the minds of so
many diverse characters to make everyone involved so life-like and charming.
_Anna Karenina_ is a book that must be read again and again. It is a book which will
mean more and more to the reader throughout each stage in his/her life. And finally, it is a book which will never fail to entertain and move even the most jaded reader.
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Summary: Classic that breathes life into the present.
Review: I picked up this book for some summer reading 4 weeks ago, and have been captivated ever since. Tolstoy tells a story of late 19th century Russia. While the events of the book are hopelessly stuck in the past, Tolstoy's prose captures the human situation better than most modern philosophers. Though he writes in the third person, Tolstoy is able to capture the feelings and flurries of his main characters, creating realistic reactions and responses to the things that plague our existence
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Summary: Greatest experience of my life while going through it.
Review: Anna Karenina will always occupy a special place in my heart as the best ever book I ever went through. Thank you
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Summary: Ayn Rand's opinion
Review: Why does Ayn Rand say that "this is the most evil book in all of serious liturature"?
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