Richard Godwin

Leo Tolstoy

Tolstoy wrote some of the most disquieting short stories the world has known—these three are no exception. Here, the duels and duality of man and woman are played out in tortured—and sometimes tragic—drama. Above all, the characters featured in these pages bring to life universal truths for the human condition; truths that Tolstoy weaves with an almost unrivaled skill. "Father Sergius" is preoccupied with the material desire for the flesh, while "The Kreutzer Sonata" caused a public sensation for its scathing indictment of marriage. Tolstoy had become convinced that "Christian marriage" was an impossibility, and in both “Sonata” and “The Devil” he launches a tirade against human sexuality and the humiliating sexual ties that bind men to women. Together these three stories provide a picture of a man obsessed with questions of moral, sexual, and religious ambiguity, his treatment of female sexuality still having a resonance today.

The Devil, the Kreutzer Sonata, Father Sergius

Tales of Sexual Desire

When Marshal of the Nobility Pozdnyshev suspects his wife of having an affair with her music partner, his jealousy consumes him and drives him to murder. Controversial upon publication in 1890, The Kreutzer Sonata illuminates Tolstoy’s then-feverish Christian ideals, his conflicts with lust and the hypocrisies of nineteenth-century marriage, and his thinking on the role of art and music in society.

The Kreutzer Sonata

Bought a copy from an estate sale because I wanted to read the book that was so controversial that Teddy Roosevelt and the USPS banned it. The only way I can describe this is “absolutely unhinged,” but not in the way Tolstoy was aiming for. 

Jacque

chris

jack

really interesting. a lot of the reviews on this website seem to want to throw the baby out with the bath water on this one, but i think there’s a lot of good stuff here!
this to me reads as split neatly into two parts, the first being almost purely didactic, the second being the actual psychological/emotional meat of the story. the latter section is brilliant, tolstoy capturing so well how it feels to be psychotically jealous. 
the first section is a bit more complex. here his prose isn’t what it could be; it’s mildly engaging but just doesn’t stay enthralling for the entirety of his rant on sex and society. further, knowing that this was essentially tolstoy’s actual views on women and sex at the time is upsetting. i want to read into this something resembling a heideggerian epoch—neither the time we are living in nor the time proposed gets any closer to a true way of being; the proposed reality merely makes clear problems in the old. but it is clear that tolstoy earnestly believed the things he wrote. while that doesn’t take away from what i can get to the text, it makes me think a little less of tolstoy. the text is riddled with sexism, but does hit upon good ideas such as the critique of some pseudo-feminist movements that put women into higher stations in society but still treat them as merely sexed objects in those stations.
it feels a bit silly and like i’m falling into a trap to be analyzing the politics of a 19th century work so much, but it’s hard not to when, like much of tolstoy’s later work, this is so openly ideologically driven.
anyways. pretty good, worth the read.

laila

gelaldv 

David McDuff

Irwin Paul Foote

The Kreutzer Sonata and Other Stories

Novel Ideas

Sergi

Sonia M

Kath

isa/bella

These four novellas, each unique in form, show Tolstoy at his creative height. Written over a period of almost fifty years, they reflect his changing views on art and sexuality, women and marriage, nationalism and ethnicity, war and empire, and the central Tolstoyan theme of love. This edition uses the famous and superior Maude translations. Contains: Family Happiness; The Kreutzer Sonata; The Cossacks; Hadji Murád.

Tales of Sexual Desire The Devil, the Kreutzer Sonata, Father Sergius

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