So, I finally found a copy of Gerald's Game! Like Dolores Claiborne, it's very different from his other books--it's much more alarming and serious in some parts, realistically creepy (think Ed Gein) at others, and 2 spooky in quite a few.
Like I mentioned a couple of posts ago, this book is about the girl that Dolores sees during the eclipse, and thinks later (at Vera's death) that the girl is in trouble. Similarly to the book, as Selena was molested, Jessie, the main character, was not molested--but there was a sexual run-in that she describes as a "scratch" more than anything else. It was bad but not the worst, but still, that's like saying a bullet to the appendix isn't as bad as to the head--it will probably still kill you or mess you up pretty badly.
Anyways, the connections to the other book pretty much end there. Jessie mentions that her visions of Dolores are like a radio picking up a signal (King 167), but... That's about it. Nothing major about it. It's almost disappointing even, because Jessie describes Dolores which sort of ruined my image of her.
So! Anyways. The book starts out with the "terrible trouble" Dolores senses on the day Vera dies. Jessie and her husband, Gerald, are at their summer home for an autumn weekend. The only way Gerald can get excited lately is by handcuffing Jessie to the bed. Jessie balks this time (later she claims it's because of the spit on her husband's chin reminds her of a certain bit of cum, but we'll get there--it might be added that she asks her husband to stop and he willfully ignores her and indeed continues crawling up on her) and eventually kicks her husband off the bed when he refuses to unhook her. He then has a major heart attack and she is left chained up to the bed.
First, the book starts with the same "path of the eclipse" map as in Dolores Claiborne--duh! But I was still surprised to see it.
Jessie faints after Gerald falls to the floor and clearly dies. Anyways, my next note doesn't have to do with the book specifically--just this edition. Someone stuck a temporary butterfly tattoo in the page break before where chapter two starts. It's pretty shocking, and kind of eerie considering there is a painting (or some kind of wall art) in the bedroom of a butterfly described later on.
Like Dolores, Jessie hears voices in her head--but not Vera, as clear as she's next to her speaking--it's her roommate from college, Ruth. She also hears a voice she has always heard that she refers to as the "goodwife" and a voice she associates with her young self, though it's not quite her, I don't think, it only looks like her in her visions.
Oh, and a stray dog gets into the house--the front door wasn't shut all the way--and begins to eat Gerald's corpse. The dog is kind of major in the book until she imagines a man/ghost that she names the "Space Cowboy" (yes, like the Steve Miller Band song)--actually, there seem to be some weird hints (or weird hints I thought I'd saw) until the end that the dog and Jessie are in for some weird Disney happily-ever-after ending--like, the dog was, for a while, the pet of a young girl, but her father didn't feel like paying for its license. Stephen King describes a couple of times how it played fetch with the young girl. So, when Jessie drops the little jar of Vaseline, I thought, you know, that the dog would instinctively grab it and bring it back despite everything and she'd use it and they'd go skipping off into the sunset. Or at the end, I thought it would protect Jessie from the Space Cowboy, despite being terrified of him... And then they'd drive off together in Jessie's car, happy as clams, happily ever after. You know. Just like how Stephen King usually does things.
When Jessie first imagines she can see her younger self (in stocks), she refers to herself as a "daughter of Eve" (King 71). Again, I suppose it's not that weird of a way to refer to a female, but, a little Chronicles of Narnia much? Peculiar.
Ruth's voice tells Jessie that "us high-riding bitches have to stick together" (King 99)--if you'll recall, one of Vera and Dolores's favourite little phrases.
Anyways, a major point in the book is Jessie admitting to herself and coming to terms with what happened that night of the eclipse--the real-life Ruth knew something bad happened to Jessie at some point, but Jessie never said it all and when Ruth started asking about it, Jessie moved out. So, with nothing really much else to do, she begins remembering.
A horrible nightmare comes first, she's playing croquet, the sun goes out, she's naked--and Gerald approaches her, but he open his mouth and the dog 's head pokes out, and then the dog's head opens and out appears his father's head (or vice versa, I can't seem to find the exact page.) I'm... not really sure how to approach that one, but it's worth pointing out for its similarities to the can tahs (taks?) in Desperation (the can tahs in The Dark Tower are a little different). The can tahs are these stone carvings of animals, some of whom have open mouths with tongues that are a different animal and such--they cause intensified sexual and violent reactions in those who touch them (for the most part), eventually driving you insane if you're in contact with them for too long. Can tahs are referred to as "little gods" in King's Desperation, can taks are "big gods"--I guess if they've been more or less controlling Jessie's behaviour and dictating a lot of her life, this weird, Freudian demon would be an acceptable "big"/"little god".
Sooo as for the eclipse itself, the family was going to a woman in the area's home to view it (might I add that Jessie's family had a summer home too). Jessie decides she wants to spend the day alone with her father--and her father agrees to that. In convincing his wife to allow that, they get into a huge fight--his wife accuses him of acting as though Jessie is more like his girlfriend than daughter. ...Well, foreshadowing alert...
What follows next is honestly one of the most disturbing things (in my opinion) that Stephen King has ever written. She sits in her father's lap to watch the eclipse--she's about twelve at the time, by the way, developed a little--but she sits in her lap, thinking nothing of it, even though it is "strangely full of angles this afternoon" (King 152). She wiggles around, trying to get comfortable and he does not push her off--he gasps, but says nothing, tells her he's fine and shifts a little on his own. What a scum.
He does not... eh, put it in, but he comes on the back of her panties. Jessie runs in to wash it (her father sends her in rather than apologizing or anything right away).
He eventually comes up after her. He apologizes, tells her she can never tell anyone, and--UGH! In Dolores Claiborne, Joe tells Selena that a wife has certain duties, a man has certain needs, and Dolores was just not doing any of it. Also she hit him in the face with the creamer. Surprise surprise, Jessie's father says the same thing--and at first says he must tell his wife. Jessie is terribly ashamed (but lucid enough to know that she shouldn't be feeling bad like that, her father should be) and begs him not to--she believes that her mother will say it's her (Jessie's) fault. I could punch Jessie's father for his reaction to this fear: "'Oh no--I don't think so,' Tom said, but his tone was surprised, considering... and to Jessie, as dreadful as a death sentence. 'No-ooo... I'm sure--well, fairly sure--that she...'" (King 182). What an awful, manipulative bastard. He saw his angle and moved right in on it. And he uses scare tactics to keep her mouth shut. What a scumbag. He tells her that her way is best, too, so if she should have to keep quiet about it, if it should torment her--well, it was her choice. Her own fault. That was what she chose and wanted. What a dick.
I seem to have lost another note regarding something in this situation--she notices, when reliving the memory, that when her father says he loves her and he's sorry when it's all through, he looks away--she becomes enraged because the whole time, as he lied to her and terrorized her, he looked her right in the eye, but he couldn't look her in the eye to tell the truth. I thought it was the other way when I read it though--he was scaring her on purpose, and then when he apologizes he looks away because he's not really sorry--not about that itself at least, he got his rocks off. This is because it's supposedly common knowledge that liars will look away from you when they lie unless if they're really good at it. Maybe he feels bad because of possible repercussions, but not that he did what he did. He undoubtedly rationalized it by saying to himself, well, at least I didn't go all the way... And, as Ruth's voice points out, he probably planned it. He does feel Jessie's breasts a couple of times before he comes. And I can't help but notice that he didn't exactly kick Jessie off his lap to go and take a cold shower or anything.
I guess I haven't really talked about the space cowboy yet, have I? Jessie sees him in what seems to be a dream, a Nosferatu-esque figure with a house doctor's old timey clutch bag made from human parts and filled with jewels. It's hard to tell if he's real or not, even at the end, though he leaves behind a muddy footprint and a pearl earring the first night. But who knows, it's Stephen King. It feels a little awkward and tacked on, and overall, 2 spooky. Like, okay. I don't now how many of you readers watch Nostalgia Critic, but a while ago he did Lilo and Stitch, and he said the relationship of the sisters is so good... But then there's Stitch. Does it have to be there? It kind of gets in the way of that already pretty powerful story. Same here. The Space Cowboy, for me, is the Stitch of this. I'm not sure if he needed to be here as a physical being.
Anyways, she gets out, she starts running because he's at the door--but then when she turns around before she gets to the car he's not there. Was it all in her head? I don't know. This is 2 spooky 4 me.
The book ends with Jessie writing a letter to her old friend Ruth--telling her every single thing that happened, including what she couldn't tell the cops. It's weird, and awkward, but it is kind of interesting. Turns out her space cowboy was an escaped serial killer--that's right, despite every awkward plot device and detail, he was real--named Raymond Andrew Joubert. Excuse me while I sigh forever and roll my eyes. I'd be lying if I didn't find this grossly interesting, the way someone might be reading about Ed Gein, but it just seems so awkward here. It doesn't need to be. I don't know how it could have ended without this afterward, but it's just so... Why? Why bother, there doesn't need to be this. Just make him some kind of mind-phantom visiting from the Dark Tower books or something. I don't know.
A story about Joubert would be its own interesting story--except that history has already done that. May I introduce you to Wikipedia. Interesting, even if it is 2 spooky and plays on some kind of cliche stuff. For example, some of the reasons why Jessie wasn't sure if he was real or not is because he appears to be very, eh, Nosferatu-like. Oh hey, turns out he has a genetic disorder! He really does look like that. And again, the serial killer angle is interesting... but hey, here's Wikipedia, you'll get the same kind of story there. Things are interesting, but I guess maybe you could say it isn't as equipped to survive in this time. I don't know. But I'm not in love with that awkward "This is how it happened" stuff--especially so late in the book.
She even confronts Joubert--he was captured and put on trial for something else--and I guess that confrontation has its own kind-of power. She yells at him, in one of her nightmarish reality-dreams that he's nothing but moonlight--when Joubert notices her he slowly raises his arms next to his head (like he was chained up) and repeats her words--"'I don't think you're anyone!... You're only made of moonlight!'" (King 329). Actually, this scene felt the most real to me, of the whole book. For some reason it was very easy to imagine Joubert's voice as King described it, and it is alarming.
Oh,. and there is a reference to Needful Things--Jessie mentions how there was a "big fire in Castle Rock about a year ago--it burned most of the downtown" (King 316-317). I'm pretty sure she mentions Alan Pangborn by name (last name only) as well, but I can't seem to actually find it. Well, either way, Alan Pangborn is the one who pretty much defeats or chases away Leland Gaunt in Needful Things.
My last note isn't so much a note on the book... didn't really have a place up there I guess, but I think I mentioned how although Jessie is chained and topless, she still has panties on. She does eventually pee herself, but for the first 24 hours or so, she is in dry panties. I feel like King did this not so much because Gerald didn't get to it yet--but because it was just too undignified (for her) to leave her completely nude and unprotected. I don't know. That's how it seemed to me, anyways.
So, overall? The book has its moments. In some ways it is one of King's most powerful books, in others it falls way short of the mark. It wasn't bad to read, but I doubt I'll ever pick this one up again--or if I do, I'll only read up to Jessie's epilogue in letters--or just that part. It's an okay sister to Dolores Claiborne, but pretending up a reason for Dolores's visions ended up doing the same amount of satisfying as this book--heck, Jessie never even addresses that after, when she is in the right frame of mind. That seems especially odd, that that's not even wondered about. I guess in comparison to everything else it's not that important, but...
Oh well. Onto the next thing when we can, I'm heading back to school soon so there probably won't be anything for a while--but see you whenever!
Works Cited: King, Stephen. Gerald's Game. Viking: United States of America, 1992.
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
Saturday, August 10, 2013
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
What's up! I just finished the 736-page-long Russian novel Anna Karenina. Like many other Russian novels, it is long and dark, unlike many others, it surprisingly wasn't that confusing, beyond keeping the names straight. And I didn't even see the movie first! How was it? Did it actually win any Oscars? I watched the Oscars but I wasn't really paying attention to that category. (Probably best adaptation or something, right?)
Anyways, this book, as one would expect, is mainly about Anna Karenin, though it starts off without her and the book ends without her, seemingly randomly focusing on a different character. The ending is interesting and it's powerful--but it almost feels like that this isn't the book it belongs in. On the other hand, like many Russian novels, this feels like it could go on forever. I don't necessarily mean it in a bad way, but it's like... life. Like there's no ending till you die, multiple "rising action" points, climaxes, whatever, then things bumble along, and of course so many lives intersect in this book.
Anyways, the book starts out with an upset woman named Darya (I'm going to stick to first names only when possible)--her husband was unfaithful to her with their English governess (strangely enough, all the governesses in this book seem to be English and most of them are portrayed as being silly, foolish, or just generally not very good at their job). Oh, and of course there is the famous opening: "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way" (Tolstoy 3). So of course, as one can imagine, we're going to see many, many unhappy families in the course of the book, and how they're all different.
Stepan ("Stiva") is ashamed and penitent, but he can't bring himself to talk to his wife, fearing she'll ask for a divorce. Stiva, although you want to dislike him in the beginning and you still kind of do, grew on me pretty quickly with his views on liberalism, and why he likes it: "The liberal party said that in Russia, everything is wrong, and certainly Stepan Arkadyevitch had many debts and was decidedly short of money. The liberal party said that marriage is an institution quite out of date, and that it needs reconstruction; and family life certainly afforded Stepan... little gratification, and forced him into lying and hypocrisy, which was so repulsive to his nature. The liberal party... allowed it to be understood, that religion is only a curb to keep in check the barbarous classes of the people; and Stepan... could not get through even a short service without his legs aching from standing up... And so liberalism had become a habit of Stepan['s]..." (Tolstoy 8-9). So you can't help but roll your eyes in amusement at him a little bit.
So my next note is about the end of 49-50--no, Anna has not appeared yet, but a very important fellow to mostly everybody's unhappiness has appeared; Vronsky. He'll become important in a while. For now, my note is mainly just an aside--the book was printed from 1873-1877 in magazines, and I imagine that it's set in about the same time. Spiritualism had become very popular in the US about this time (Lincoln's wife is credited with a lot of this influence much of the time) and apparently the same is true is Russia. Stepan objects because it seems like a fraud to him, Vronsky insists they try "table-turning" (Tolstoy 50). It's more or less an old school Ouija board--everyone puts their hands on the table and hopes it turns. I guess. Oh, and no letters. So actually, it's more like an eleven-year-old girl's slumber party, when everyone tries to pick up one of their friends with the tips of their fingers.
Anna's first major appearance in the novel doesn't come till page 64--she visits Darya to persuade her against splitting with Stepan. Her advice is fluff, and even without knowing where it would go next (though being fully capable of guessing based on this) it seemed kind of like nothingness. She just basically says, you and your children are sacred to him even if he was unfaithful--this was not an "'infidelity of the heart'" (Tolstoy 65), just his loins. I don't think I would have bought it. In retrospect, it is also ironic because--surprise--the Karenin family becomes unhappy because Anna ends up cheating on her husband. And while she still regards her son with her husband as divine, she barely makes any effort to honour him and forgets about him a lot and becomes creepily obsessed with her new beau. And she deliberately spits in her husband's face when he attempts to allow the affair to happen (because he senses there's simply nothing he can do) and finally part so that she can continue unhindered. I'm getting ahead of myself, but urgh! Anna drives me nuts. When she helps her sister-in-law it seems like fluff, but you get the idea that she's sophisticated, knowledgeable, etc, and very quickly that view back flips about nine thousand times. Anyways--Stepan and his wife do not get divorced... And Anna's happy fluff does nothing, unsurprisingly meant nothing. On page 110 you discover that Stepan wasn't to be trusted, he still is never home, money's going... All the usual signs that something's up, and that there's real no question of what the "something" could be.
So we run into Darya's youngest sister on page 70--Kitty, looking for a beau, and actually having attained Vronsky from the table-turning scene has him. It seems pretty obvious that they're going to be wed... She even refuses her other suitor, Levin, for him. Unfortunately, Vronsky is bewitched by Anna at a ball, and vice versa. So Kitty falls into such a despair she almost dies, and there is one more unhappy family, and of course there is Anna's own family, her husband and son, who also suffer. At first she was frightened of her feelings, thinking when I get back home, I'll see my son and my husband again, and that'll be great, everything will be normal again--she immediately notices how "gross" her husband is and it goes down pretty quickly from there (as quickly as possible in a 700+ page novel). She's even a little disappointed when she sees her beloved son, but I think in his case it's because he's an undeniable symbol that she's kind of stuck where she is tight. Vronsky also gets agitated when he first meets Alexey (Anna's husband) because "He could recognize in no one but himself an indubitable right to lover her" (Tolstoy 95), assures himself that he doesn't love her, and yeah. Makes sense that he wouldn't like Alexey but looking back on it I just want to grab him and kick him in the butt out of there going "Leave them alone!!"
My next note is page 103--mainly just about Vronsky's outlook on life. I don't think they ever specifically say, but I came to believe that Vronsky was at least a couple of years younger than Anna. So he's living in a time of blooming dandies (remember, at this point Oscar Wilde was currently overspending at Oxford), and he's young. He's from St Petersburg and in "his" Petersburg there's a lower and upper class: lower being "vulgar, stupid, and above all, ridiculous... who believe[d] that one husband ought to live with the one wife whom he has lawfully married... a woman modest... that [a man] ought to bring up one's own children" (Tolstoy 103). The other being his class, the "real" people (Tolstoy 103)--so he's kind of scum right from the beginning. I guess you can't fault anybody for fooling around, but walking out on a kid, cheating on a spouse, willingly leading someone away from a family (Vronsky is completely unbothered and I don't think he even spares a thought for Anna's son)--Vronsky is the same old, ancient story of having fun and willfully ignoring any sense of personal responsibility. He gets his as Anna starts losing it, but weirdly I started sympathizing with him at that point. But now, thinking about it--yeah, he got what he deserved with all of that.
Vronsky, like Stepan earlier, bemoans his positions which forces him to lie and deceive--so against his nature. Of course, this pushes the blame off himself. He isn't bad, just the situation. Unfortunately for him, in this situation, I'm not buying it, especially since he convinces himself that finally now Anna is happy (she was more than happy before she ever ran into him, mind you). Oh boy, thanks for making that possible. And admittedly, in the middle of a long inner "monologue" on page 167, it is revealed that Vronsky "felt that the love that bound him to Anna was not a momentary impulse, which would pass" (Tolstoy 167). Maybe not--but eventually Anna's overbearing jealousy did chase him away. They're both equally at fault, I guess, but their position just agitates me so! Anna is so hardheaded though, that it's hard for me to not dislike her more, even while knowing Vronsky isn't the greatest guy either.
Going back to Kitty, the doctors prescribe her "Soden waters" for her sickness (Tolstoy 108) because they don't know what to do for her, but the waters were "a remedy obviously prescribed primarily on the ground that they could do no harm" (Tolstoy 108). Soden waters are apparently waters imported from special springs in Bad Soden, Germany. The waters have high mineral content and whatnot which may or may not give them special mending properties.
Ah, and this is more a note to myself, but I'd love to see a queer theory reading of Kitty and her friend Varenka. Kitty meets her in the midst of her slump and she begins to admire her and love her greatly. She kind of gets out of her slump too--what better way to get away from a broken heart than for someone to mend it? For some reason the small interlude seems to have homoerotic tones to it... If anyone who reads this could point me towards such an essay or dissection, please point me towards it with a link or something! I'd appreciate it.
Tolstoy also briefly smears romanticists: Levin, the fellow who was turned down by Kitty for Vronsky lives in a country, works the land. His brother, not so much. "To Konstantin Levin the country was good first because it afforded a field for labor, of the usefulness there could be no doubt. To Sergey Ivanovitch the country was particularly good, because there it was possible and fitting to do nothing" (Tolstoy 217). Shhh, pastorals. Shhh. I love it when romanticists get made into fools in books... The best is in Kurt Vonnegut's Player Piano, which addresses how realistically someone could adapt to such a life. (Answer: not well, not easily. At all.)
"'It's hard to love a woman and do anything'" (Tolstoy 284). This is just a bit of one of Vronsky's friend's attempt at trying to convince Vronsky away from Anna (or any married woman). I just kind of liked that bit.
Anyways. As I kind of mentioned, Alexey has no power over his wife--he allows the affair, only if she meets Vronsky away from the house... Which, of course, she breaks without a second thought. Anyways--the conversation they have that very night which marks Alexey finally displacing his wife for good marks the first real bad spot in their relationship. Anna starts showing her weird jealous side--though she claims she isn't, a bit. "'I'm not jealous: I believe you when you're here; but when you're away somewhere leading your life...'" (Tolstoy 328). So, yeah, she is. Anyways, it starts when Vronsky is complaining of a certain man who cares for nothing but "animal pleasures"--to which she responds "'But don't you care at all for these animal pleasures?'" (Tolstoy 328). I thought it was about to get a little sexy, was about to applaud Tolstoy for unbuttoning the top button--but no, it's not sexy times--at least not for them. And it's not out of the question, I'm pretty sure at this point she's--surprise cause I'm pretty sure condoms didn't exist then--pregnant with Vronsky's daughter. (Later a sickness deems her infertile and you can feel Vronsky's heart sinking when she does coded-ly say that sexy times can be all the time now.)
Anyways, they fight, Alexey reminds Anna that she's acting horribly, Anna admits it to herself then but as is Anna's way, conveniently forgets it about thirty seconds later. So she goes abroad with Vronsky, "having absolutely declined all idea of one" (Tolstoy 395).
What drives me nuts about this is that over and over Anna claims she no longer cares in the slightest for her husband--but she misses her son, she would do the divorce if it was assured she could take her son. (Well, even at times when she is promised that it would be possible she refuses, saying that it would force her to recognize that she wronged her husband [Tolstoy 578].) Meanwhile, she barely ever remembers him unless if she's thinking of reasons not to bother with the work of filing for a divorce, and she only visits him once in the course of pretty much the rest of the book. In fact, it's so infrequent that when Alexey tells their son that she is dead, it's believable. She just disappears. Even the daughter she has with Vronsky is kind of pushed to the side--she always says she's happy, she loves it, and when it is first born she is indeed so excited that she "rarely" thinks of her son (Tolstoy 423)--but it's kind of like the baby in The Great Gatsby. "WHAT BABY?" There are even a few scenes towards the end where she helps take care of the baby and though she's not trying to eat it, it's clear that she's usually not helping the nurse or even in the room--Darya sees at once that "Anna, the two nurses, and the child had no common existence, and that the mother's visit was something exceptional" (Tolstoy 560). Anna doesn't even really know where things are kept in the nursery, and, most damning of all, she doesn't even know how many teeth the baby has, which seems like a little thing, but considering how much she goes crazy over the baby that is pretty surprising. Also considering how crazy new moms are over their kids in general... So, there's really nothing (for me) that redeems Anna--she just seems like a whiny, creepily jealous layabout! Ugghhhh. She's like the girl in Gone With the Wind, but lazy and stupid.
"'I'm no judge, of course. But good judges have said the same'" (Tolstoy 422). Anna, you need to stop, because I'm like three seconds from throwing up all over you forever.
So, Anna gets worse when they are in Italy. That quote is referring to a picture Vronsky painted of her--in Italy she has a (young) nurse with a son for her daughter--and she treats her condescendingly for fear of becoming jealous. Anna, baby, I hate to say it, but if you're acting like that and you're worried about that, you're already there. But they can still coincide more or less, and Vronsky is still wanting her to divorce Alexey so that they may get married (so I guess he's not the worst...) Anna isn't completely insufferable at this point. But oh, is it coming...
Very small aside--this edition has drawings in it every so often, and although I had noticed it in many of the other drawings up to this point, I marked the picture on the "Part Six" page splitter (Tolstoy 499)--1870s Russia is a lot like 1870s America, at least in the country. Men in stetsons, men looking like civil war soldiers... The kids in this particular drawing are a little fancier, but the man watching the woman picking mushrooms with the kids looks like a skinny Colonel Sanders. I just thought that it was such a strange similarity!
Oh, and speaking of that mushroom-picking scene, Tolstoy totally makes a dick joke in that part and nobody can convince me otherwise! Sergey wants to ask the woman watching the kids to marry him, but he is too embarrassed and screws it up--they get into a conversation about mushrooms. Instead of blurting out the question, he asks "'What is the difference between the "birch" mushroom and the "white" mushroom?' Varenka's lips quivered with emotion as she answered: 'In the top part there is scarcely any difference, it's in the stalk'" (Tolstoy 513). TOLSTOY JUST SAID IT, YOU READ IT HERE, TOLSTOY JUST SAID THAT SIZE (/GIRTH) IS WHAT COUNTS.
Tolstoy also makes a really weird narrative change on page 539. It's nothing major, but for a couple of lines we get to see the thoughts of Levin's hunting dog. She is confused because Levin can see prey, the dog, lower to the ground, cannot. The dog gets confused, has a few lines expressing that, and then she kind of shrugs and goes running out blindly. It punches you out of the story because you never get anything like that from an animal, and because Tolstoy could have easily conveyed the same thing without giving the dog apparent sentience. He could of just said something like, "Laska hesitated, she was confused--she could not see a thing. But when Levin urged her again, she seemed to shrug and went on to do as she was told"--or something like that. Just--what was the point, for just this one time!? Uuurgh, Tolstoy! Come on. I'd be angrier if not for the dick joke. Sorry I'm not sorry.
Ah, next note, page 600. Let me digress for a moment. I'm sure you've all had a friend who gets a crush on somebody. Well, I don't know if it's always quite the same for guys. But you have a friend, female in my experience, and she likes a dude. At first it's nothing but a crush. It may or may not be clear to many around that she has the hots for this guy, but your friend has told you. So she starts texting him. And she overdoes it hard. For example, constantly texting, reacting to the wrong things, reacting badly--and even though you're sitting there saying, don't say that, don't do that, rephrase that message or better yet, don't send any--your friend continues doing exactly whatever she feels the impulse to. From a little before 600 on (more like around the end of part five on) the book regarding Anna and Vronsky more or less becomes the low-tech version of this. In this case, Vronsky sends a telegram--Anna panics because Vronsky had to be away all weekend and without waiting for a word from him, sends her own telegram trying to get him back home--she says the baby is very ill. The only logical explanation? She says she's going to Vronsky (sans child)! She doesn't of course--she gets the telegram from Vronsky and has to recover quickly. Familiar? Yeahhh. Well, at its most basic points.
Oh, speaking of queer theory readings of the text--there's a very odd, fish-out-of-water moment on page 670. Vronsky and Anna are fighting, and Anna pulls out a very strange line--"'The one thing I cared for here was Hannah... Why, you said yesterday that I don't love my daughter, that I love this English girl, that it's unnatural. I should like to know what life there is for me that could be natural!'" (Tolstoy 670). I'm not pulling for this one. Again, hook me up with a critical essay, PLEASE.
Oh, and Anna becomes more of a bitch than ever. During that fight, Anna decides to leave--because Vronsky wants to go somewhere on Sunday, and she wants him to stay till Monday because she's getting more controlling. She walks out, Vronsky just shrugs and says enough is enough already.
On the way home Anna shows her absolutely worst and puts herself beyond redemption--she's good at charming people, and at a later point she meets up with Kitty and Levin--remember, Kitty and Vronsky were to be wed before she got in between them. So things are awkward initially, but it's clear that Kitty and Levin are happy together and it's more or less water under the bridge. But Anna, reflecting on it: "'If I were an immoral woman I could have made her husband fall in love with me... If I'd cared to. And, indeed, I did care to'" (Tolstoy 685). Admittedly there are a few moments where it looks a bit touch and go in that situation, but Levin seems fine once Anna has left. And again, Anna, you are pretty awful--if you're thinking it, you're already there...
In this section she also has a semi-long monologue that's punctuated with sentences (thought by her) regarding what she sees. And then once she says the seemingly incongruous sentence, Tolstoy then explains what's going on. Makes for some odd moments: "'He thought he knew me. Well, he knows me as well as any one in the world knows me. I don't know myself. I know my appetites, as the French say. They want that dirty ice-cream, that they do know for certain,' she thought, looking at two boys stopping an ice-cream seller" (Tolstoy 685). How weird. "Dirty ice cream". Uh... Well, I see how it is like a little metaphor and all, but what a silly-sounding one! Also she keeps on calling it a "dirty ice" (Tolstoy 685). Is that, like, a thing?
As the story begins without Anna, so it ends without her. Anna's little monologue on page 685 leads to a hateful trip on the train--reviling everyone and everything around her. Spoiler alerts: Anna kills herself finally on the train. She's miserable, and the couple in her compartment are having a debate. This debate ignites a sudden revelation, and to "punish" Vronsky and "escape from every one and from myself" (Tolstoy 692) and throws herself in front of the train once she has arrived at the station. It is worth noting that she dies kneeling (as though praying), and calling out to God to forgiveness (I'm still making the stern face, Anna).
It is ironic that Vronsky's mother, a little bit later, calls it the "'death of a vile woman, of no religious feeling'" (Tolstoy 703). But it makes sense that she would hate Anna--of course Vronsky is more or less drinking his sorrows away and is in an awful state. He was punished (not very Christian, Anna!). And he bemoans the fact--along with everything else--that she was triumphant in punishing him.
Her death sends Levin into a troubled spiral about his life and the meaning of life. So at the end it feels like we're finally getting to what Tolstoy wanted to talk about--some philosophical discourse. But it feels awkward, especially since... Well, the titular character is dead. And now this question is coming into play, where before it existed but never as a major theme. It's... interesting, but it's almost tiresome to go into it. It's like the end of Return of the King--this stuff is important and necessary to see, but it feels like everything happened and you're kind of ready to just tuck in for a nap and be done. I'm kind of losing steam with this post (it's been a while since I've done such a long post...) but I can hold out for a little bit longer.
Levin considers suicide, avoids it out of fear--he has a revelation (read on for it) which fills him with joy, mainly he realizes that he is in fact Christian and that every human has to choose what's right for themselves (and making mistakes happens for any human, no matter what) and that he'll be able to improve himself. His reason brought him there as Anna's brought her to suicide, and they both turn to God in the heat of those moments.
He also, even more importantly, realizes he does love the son borne to him by Kitty--something Anna, although she claimed she could, had trouble with. Not loving Kitty and Levin's baby, of course--loving her own children, especially her baby. Anna loved her kids at first, and kind of got bored with them, unless if she could use them in some way to attract Vronsky's attention, or anybody's, really. Levin is kind of troubled and grossed out by the baby, and I imagine Anna's death also makes him wonder what the point of the birth was to begin with--but after a ferocious storm, and the baby appearing to recognize both Levin and Anna, he realizes that he loves his son more than anything. This realization more or less brings on the revelation that pretty much closes the book out. Unlike Anna, Levin announces to take full responsibility for his life, as I said, even the mistakes--he knows he can't realistically escape or stop his temper and suddenly become a holy man. So is Anna meant to be a "bad" example of a person, and Levin good? Not just because of their actions--I don't think Tolstoy necessarily thought Anna was bad because of what she did. But she wasn't willing to act for herself, take what she nodded, she just kind of dragged everyone around her down and manipulated them, whereas Levin ends with the strong conviction to live as best as he can as he needs to. And it's impossible to not notice that the book ends focused on a completely happy family. A family apparently just like any other!
Tolstoy published the book after he was married for about a decade and had many of his children, so one would imagine that his ideas on the subjects inside are pretty valid too.
Sorry if this post was kind of sparse and unbalanced. This was the longest book I've done in a while and I was kind of out of practice. Also I'm on mad meds right now, haha. Anyways, it wasn't that bad. It was good, and though I think it's kind of ridiculous when book polls name in the number one book of all time (especially a magazine like Entertainment Weekly), it is really good. I'm still thinking like top three at the highest. I would recommend it, even if you don't have a lot of time on your hands, it's a relatively quick read (considering). It also helps to have a basic knowledge of Russian history; I had the good luck of having happened to have read a book on Russian history to about 1985 shortly before reading this, so I kind of knew about what Tolstoy was commenting on. Kind of. Anyways, next book, not sure, but hopefully I'll write about it when I can get off these horrible horse pills. See you all later!
Works Cited: Tolstoy, Leo. Anna Karenina. International Collectors Library: New York, 1944.
(Note on the edition: it's one of those awful ones that look really fancy and nice, but when you actually start reading it, you realize it's basically made out of cardboard. I call this the "Readers' Digest" version. Eugh...)
Anyways, this book, as one would expect, is mainly about Anna Karenin, though it starts off without her and the book ends without her, seemingly randomly focusing on a different character. The ending is interesting and it's powerful--but it almost feels like that this isn't the book it belongs in. On the other hand, like many Russian novels, this feels like it could go on forever. I don't necessarily mean it in a bad way, but it's like... life. Like there's no ending till you die, multiple "rising action" points, climaxes, whatever, then things bumble along, and of course so many lives intersect in this book.
Anyways, the book starts out with an upset woman named Darya (I'm going to stick to first names only when possible)--her husband was unfaithful to her with their English governess (strangely enough, all the governesses in this book seem to be English and most of them are portrayed as being silly, foolish, or just generally not very good at their job). Oh, and of course there is the famous opening: "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way" (Tolstoy 3). So of course, as one can imagine, we're going to see many, many unhappy families in the course of the book, and how they're all different.
Stepan ("Stiva") is ashamed and penitent, but he can't bring himself to talk to his wife, fearing she'll ask for a divorce. Stiva, although you want to dislike him in the beginning and you still kind of do, grew on me pretty quickly with his views on liberalism, and why he likes it: "The liberal party said that in Russia, everything is wrong, and certainly Stepan Arkadyevitch had many debts and was decidedly short of money. The liberal party said that marriage is an institution quite out of date, and that it needs reconstruction; and family life certainly afforded Stepan... little gratification, and forced him into lying and hypocrisy, which was so repulsive to his nature. The liberal party... allowed it to be understood, that religion is only a curb to keep in check the barbarous classes of the people; and Stepan... could not get through even a short service without his legs aching from standing up... And so liberalism had become a habit of Stepan['s]..." (Tolstoy 8-9). So you can't help but roll your eyes in amusement at him a little bit.
So my next note is about the end of 49-50--no, Anna has not appeared yet, but a very important fellow to mostly everybody's unhappiness has appeared; Vronsky. He'll become important in a while. For now, my note is mainly just an aside--the book was printed from 1873-1877 in magazines, and I imagine that it's set in about the same time. Spiritualism had become very popular in the US about this time (Lincoln's wife is credited with a lot of this influence much of the time) and apparently the same is true is Russia. Stepan objects because it seems like a fraud to him, Vronsky insists they try "table-turning" (Tolstoy 50). It's more or less an old school Ouija board--everyone puts their hands on the table and hopes it turns. I guess. Oh, and no letters. So actually, it's more like an eleven-year-old girl's slumber party, when everyone tries to pick up one of their friends with the tips of their fingers.
Anna's first major appearance in the novel doesn't come till page 64--she visits Darya to persuade her against splitting with Stepan. Her advice is fluff, and even without knowing where it would go next (though being fully capable of guessing based on this) it seemed kind of like nothingness. She just basically says, you and your children are sacred to him even if he was unfaithful--this was not an "'infidelity of the heart'" (Tolstoy 65), just his loins. I don't think I would have bought it. In retrospect, it is also ironic because--surprise--the Karenin family becomes unhappy because Anna ends up cheating on her husband. And while she still regards her son with her husband as divine, she barely makes any effort to honour him and forgets about him a lot and becomes creepily obsessed with her new beau. And she deliberately spits in her husband's face when he attempts to allow the affair to happen (because he senses there's simply nothing he can do) and finally part so that she can continue unhindered. I'm getting ahead of myself, but urgh! Anna drives me nuts. When she helps her sister-in-law it seems like fluff, but you get the idea that she's sophisticated, knowledgeable, etc, and very quickly that view back flips about nine thousand times. Anyways--Stepan and his wife do not get divorced... And Anna's happy fluff does nothing, unsurprisingly meant nothing. On page 110 you discover that Stepan wasn't to be trusted, he still is never home, money's going... All the usual signs that something's up, and that there's real no question of what the "something" could be.
So we run into Darya's youngest sister on page 70--Kitty, looking for a beau, and actually having attained Vronsky from the table-turning scene has him. It seems pretty obvious that they're going to be wed... She even refuses her other suitor, Levin, for him. Unfortunately, Vronsky is bewitched by Anna at a ball, and vice versa. So Kitty falls into such a despair she almost dies, and there is one more unhappy family, and of course there is Anna's own family, her husband and son, who also suffer. At first she was frightened of her feelings, thinking when I get back home, I'll see my son and my husband again, and that'll be great, everything will be normal again--she immediately notices how "gross" her husband is and it goes down pretty quickly from there (as quickly as possible in a 700+ page novel). She's even a little disappointed when she sees her beloved son, but I think in his case it's because he's an undeniable symbol that she's kind of stuck where she is tight. Vronsky also gets agitated when he first meets Alexey (Anna's husband) because "He could recognize in no one but himself an indubitable right to lover her" (Tolstoy 95), assures himself that he doesn't love her, and yeah. Makes sense that he wouldn't like Alexey but looking back on it I just want to grab him and kick him in the butt out of there going "Leave them alone!!"
My next note is page 103--mainly just about Vronsky's outlook on life. I don't think they ever specifically say, but I came to believe that Vronsky was at least a couple of years younger than Anna. So he's living in a time of blooming dandies (remember, at this point Oscar Wilde was currently overspending at Oxford), and he's young. He's from St Petersburg and in "his" Petersburg there's a lower and upper class: lower being "vulgar, stupid, and above all, ridiculous... who believe[d] that one husband ought to live with the one wife whom he has lawfully married... a woman modest... that [a man] ought to bring up one's own children" (Tolstoy 103). The other being his class, the "real" people (Tolstoy 103)--so he's kind of scum right from the beginning. I guess you can't fault anybody for fooling around, but walking out on a kid, cheating on a spouse, willingly leading someone away from a family (Vronsky is completely unbothered and I don't think he even spares a thought for Anna's son)--Vronsky is the same old, ancient story of having fun and willfully ignoring any sense of personal responsibility. He gets his as Anna starts losing it, but weirdly I started sympathizing with him at that point. But now, thinking about it--yeah, he got what he deserved with all of that.
Vronsky, like Stepan earlier, bemoans his positions which forces him to lie and deceive--so against his nature. Of course, this pushes the blame off himself. He isn't bad, just the situation. Unfortunately for him, in this situation, I'm not buying it, especially since he convinces himself that finally now Anna is happy (she was more than happy before she ever ran into him, mind you). Oh boy, thanks for making that possible. And admittedly, in the middle of a long inner "monologue" on page 167, it is revealed that Vronsky "felt that the love that bound him to Anna was not a momentary impulse, which would pass" (Tolstoy 167). Maybe not--but eventually Anna's overbearing jealousy did chase him away. They're both equally at fault, I guess, but their position just agitates me so! Anna is so hardheaded though, that it's hard for me to not dislike her more, even while knowing Vronsky isn't the greatest guy either.
Going back to Kitty, the doctors prescribe her "Soden waters" for her sickness (Tolstoy 108) because they don't know what to do for her, but the waters were "a remedy obviously prescribed primarily on the ground that they could do no harm" (Tolstoy 108). Soden waters are apparently waters imported from special springs in Bad Soden, Germany. The waters have high mineral content and whatnot which may or may not give them special mending properties.
Ah, and this is more a note to myself, but I'd love to see a queer theory reading of Kitty and her friend Varenka. Kitty meets her in the midst of her slump and she begins to admire her and love her greatly. She kind of gets out of her slump too--what better way to get away from a broken heart than for someone to mend it? For some reason the small interlude seems to have homoerotic tones to it... If anyone who reads this could point me towards such an essay or dissection, please point me towards it with a link or something! I'd appreciate it.
Tolstoy also briefly smears romanticists: Levin, the fellow who was turned down by Kitty for Vronsky lives in a country, works the land. His brother, not so much. "To Konstantin Levin the country was good first because it afforded a field for labor, of the usefulness there could be no doubt. To Sergey Ivanovitch the country was particularly good, because there it was possible and fitting to do nothing" (Tolstoy 217). Shhh, pastorals. Shhh. I love it when romanticists get made into fools in books... The best is in Kurt Vonnegut's Player Piano, which addresses how realistically someone could adapt to such a life. (Answer: not well, not easily. At all.)
"'It's hard to love a woman and do anything'" (Tolstoy 284). This is just a bit of one of Vronsky's friend's attempt at trying to convince Vronsky away from Anna (or any married woman). I just kind of liked that bit.
Anyways. As I kind of mentioned, Alexey has no power over his wife--he allows the affair, only if she meets Vronsky away from the house... Which, of course, she breaks without a second thought. Anyways--the conversation they have that very night which marks Alexey finally displacing his wife for good marks the first real bad spot in their relationship. Anna starts showing her weird jealous side--though she claims she isn't, a bit. "'I'm not jealous: I believe you when you're here; but when you're away somewhere leading your life...'" (Tolstoy 328). So, yeah, she is. Anyways, it starts when Vronsky is complaining of a certain man who cares for nothing but "animal pleasures"--to which she responds "'But don't you care at all for these animal pleasures?'" (Tolstoy 328). I thought it was about to get a little sexy, was about to applaud Tolstoy for unbuttoning the top button--but no, it's not sexy times--at least not for them. And it's not out of the question, I'm pretty sure at this point she's--surprise cause I'm pretty sure condoms didn't exist then--pregnant with Vronsky's daughter. (Later a sickness deems her infertile and you can feel Vronsky's heart sinking when she does coded-ly say that sexy times can be all the time now.)
Anyways, they fight, Alexey reminds Anna that she's acting horribly, Anna admits it to herself then but as is Anna's way, conveniently forgets it about thirty seconds later. So she goes abroad with Vronsky, "having absolutely declined all idea of one" (Tolstoy 395).
What drives me nuts about this is that over and over Anna claims she no longer cares in the slightest for her husband--but she misses her son, she would do the divorce if it was assured she could take her son. (Well, even at times when she is promised that it would be possible she refuses, saying that it would force her to recognize that she wronged her husband [Tolstoy 578].) Meanwhile, she barely ever remembers him unless if she's thinking of reasons not to bother with the work of filing for a divorce, and she only visits him once in the course of pretty much the rest of the book. In fact, it's so infrequent that when Alexey tells their son that she is dead, it's believable. She just disappears. Even the daughter she has with Vronsky is kind of pushed to the side--she always says she's happy, she loves it, and when it is first born she is indeed so excited that she "rarely" thinks of her son (Tolstoy 423)--but it's kind of like the baby in The Great Gatsby. "WHAT BABY?" There are even a few scenes towards the end where she helps take care of the baby and though she's not trying to eat it, it's clear that she's usually not helping the nurse or even in the room--Darya sees at once that "Anna, the two nurses, and the child had no common existence, and that the mother's visit was something exceptional" (Tolstoy 560). Anna doesn't even really know where things are kept in the nursery, and, most damning of all, she doesn't even know how many teeth the baby has, which seems like a little thing, but considering how much she goes crazy over the baby that is pretty surprising. Also considering how crazy new moms are over their kids in general... So, there's really nothing (for me) that redeems Anna--she just seems like a whiny, creepily jealous layabout! Ugghhhh. She's like the girl in Gone With the Wind, but lazy and stupid.
"'I'm no judge, of course. But good judges have said the same'" (Tolstoy 422). Anna, you need to stop, because I'm like three seconds from throwing up all over you forever.
So, Anna gets worse when they are in Italy. That quote is referring to a picture Vronsky painted of her--in Italy she has a (young) nurse with a son for her daughter--and she treats her condescendingly for fear of becoming jealous. Anna, baby, I hate to say it, but if you're acting like that and you're worried about that, you're already there. But they can still coincide more or less, and Vronsky is still wanting her to divorce Alexey so that they may get married (so I guess he's not the worst...) Anna isn't completely insufferable at this point. But oh, is it coming...
Very small aside--this edition has drawings in it every so often, and although I had noticed it in many of the other drawings up to this point, I marked the picture on the "Part Six" page splitter (Tolstoy 499)--1870s Russia is a lot like 1870s America, at least in the country. Men in stetsons, men looking like civil war soldiers... The kids in this particular drawing are a little fancier, but the man watching the woman picking mushrooms with the kids looks like a skinny Colonel Sanders. I just thought that it was such a strange similarity!
Oh, and speaking of that mushroom-picking scene, Tolstoy totally makes a dick joke in that part and nobody can convince me otherwise! Sergey wants to ask the woman watching the kids to marry him, but he is too embarrassed and screws it up--they get into a conversation about mushrooms. Instead of blurting out the question, he asks "'What is the difference between the "birch" mushroom and the "white" mushroom?' Varenka's lips quivered with emotion as she answered: 'In the top part there is scarcely any difference, it's in the stalk'" (Tolstoy 513). TOLSTOY JUST SAID IT, YOU READ IT HERE, TOLSTOY JUST SAID THAT SIZE (/GIRTH) IS WHAT COUNTS.
Tolstoy also makes a really weird narrative change on page 539. It's nothing major, but for a couple of lines we get to see the thoughts of Levin's hunting dog. She is confused because Levin can see prey, the dog, lower to the ground, cannot. The dog gets confused, has a few lines expressing that, and then she kind of shrugs and goes running out blindly. It punches you out of the story because you never get anything like that from an animal, and because Tolstoy could have easily conveyed the same thing without giving the dog apparent sentience. He could of just said something like, "Laska hesitated, she was confused--she could not see a thing. But when Levin urged her again, she seemed to shrug and went on to do as she was told"--or something like that. Just--what was the point, for just this one time!? Uuurgh, Tolstoy! Come on. I'd be angrier if not for the dick joke. Sorry I'm not sorry.
Ah, next note, page 600. Let me digress for a moment. I'm sure you've all had a friend who gets a crush on somebody. Well, I don't know if it's always quite the same for guys. But you have a friend, female in my experience, and she likes a dude. At first it's nothing but a crush. It may or may not be clear to many around that she has the hots for this guy, but your friend has told you. So she starts texting him. And she overdoes it hard. For example, constantly texting, reacting to the wrong things, reacting badly--and even though you're sitting there saying, don't say that, don't do that, rephrase that message or better yet, don't send any--your friend continues doing exactly whatever she feels the impulse to. From a little before 600 on (more like around the end of part five on) the book regarding Anna and Vronsky more or less becomes the low-tech version of this. In this case, Vronsky sends a telegram--Anna panics because Vronsky had to be away all weekend and without waiting for a word from him, sends her own telegram trying to get him back home--she says the baby is very ill. The only logical explanation? She says she's going to Vronsky (sans child)! She doesn't of course--she gets the telegram from Vronsky and has to recover quickly. Familiar? Yeahhh. Well, at its most basic points.
Oh, speaking of queer theory readings of the text--there's a very odd, fish-out-of-water moment on page 670. Vronsky and Anna are fighting, and Anna pulls out a very strange line--"'The one thing I cared for here was Hannah... Why, you said yesterday that I don't love my daughter, that I love this English girl, that it's unnatural. I should like to know what life there is for me that could be natural!'" (Tolstoy 670). I'm not pulling for this one. Again, hook me up with a critical essay, PLEASE.
Oh, and Anna becomes more of a bitch than ever. During that fight, Anna decides to leave--because Vronsky wants to go somewhere on Sunday, and she wants him to stay till Monday because she's getting more controlling. She walks out, Vronsky just shrugs and says enough is enough already.
On the way home Anna shows her absolutely worst and puts herself beyond redemption--she's good at charming people, and at a later point she meets up with Kitty and Levin--remember, Kitty and Vronsky were to be wed before she got in between them. So things are awkward initially, but it's clear that Kitty and Levin are happy together and it's more or less water under the bridge. But Anna, reflecting on it: "'If I were an immoral woman I could have made her husband fall in love with me... If I'd cared to. And, indeed, I did care to'" (Tolstoy 685). Admittedly there are a few moments where it looks a bit touch and go in that situation, but Levin seems fine once Anna has left. And again, Anna, you are pretty awful--if you're thinking it, you're already there...
In this section she also has a semi-long monologue that's punctuated with sentences (thought by her) regarding what she sees. And then once she says the seemingly incongruous sentence, Tolstoy then explains what's going on. Makes for some odd moments: "'He thought he knew me. Well, he knows me as well as any one in the world knows me. I don't know myself. I know my appetites, as the French say. They want that dirty ice-cream, that they do know for certain,' she thought, looking at two boys stopping an ice-cream seller" (Tolstoy 685). How weird. "Dirty ice cream". Uh... Well, I see how it is like a little metaphor and all, but what a silly-sounding one! Also she keeps on calling it a "dirty ice" (Tolstoy 685). Is that, like, a thing?
As the story begins without Anna, so it ends without her. Anna's little monologue on page 685 leads to a hateful trip on the train--reviling everyone and everything around her. Spoiler alerts: Anna kills herself finally on the train. She's miserable, and the couple in her compartment are having a debate. This debate ignites a sudden revelation, and to "punish" Vronsky and "escape from every one and from myself" (Tolstoy 692) and throws herself in front of the train once she has arrived at the station. It is worth noting that she dies kneeling (as though praying), and calling out to God to forgiveness (I'm still making the stern face, Anna).
It is ironic that Vronsky's mother, a little bit later, calls it the "'death of a vile woman, of no religious feeling'" (Tolstoy 703). But it makes sense that she would hate Anna--of course Vronsky is more or less drinking his sorrows away and is in an awful state. He was punished (not very Christian, Anna!). And he bemoans the fact--along with everything else--that she was triumphant in punishing him.
Her death sends Levin into a troubled spiral about his life and the meaning of life. So at the end it feels like we're finally getting to what Tolstoy wanted to talk about--some philosophical discourse. But it feels awkward, especially since... Well, the titular character is dead. And now this question is coming into play, where before it existed but never as a major theme. It's... interesting, but it's almost tiresome to go into it. It's like the end of Return of the King--this stuff is important and necessary to see, but it feels like everything happened and you're kind of ready to just tuck in for a nap and be done. I'm kind of losing steam with this post (it's been a while since I've done such a long post...) but I can hold out for a little bit longer.
Levin considers suicide, avoids it out of fear--he has a revelation (read on for it) which fills him with joy, mainly he realizes that he is in fact Christian and that every human has to choose what's right for themselves (and making mistakes happens for any human, no matter what) and that he'll be able to improve himself. His reason brought him there as Anna's brought her to suicide, and they both turn to God in the heat of those moments.
He also, even more importantly, realizes he does love the son borne to him by Kitty--something Anna, although she claimed she could, had trouble with. Not loving Kitty and Levin's baby, of course--loving her own children, especially her baby. Anna loved her kids at first, and kind of got bored with them, unless if she could use them in some way to attract Vronsky's attention, or anybody's, really. Levin is kind of troubled and grossed out by the baby, and I imagine Anna's death also makes him wonder what the point of the birth was to begin with--but after a ferocious storm, and the baby appearing to recognize both Levin and Anna, he realizes that he loves his son more than anything. This realization more or less brings on the revelation that pretty much closes the book out. Unlike Anna, Levin announces to take full responsibility for his life, as I said, even the mistakes--he knows he can't realistically escape or stop his temper and suddenly become a holy man. So is Anna meant to be a "bad" example of a person, and Levin good? Not just because of their actions--I don't think Tolstoy necessarily thought Anna was bad because of what she did. But she wasn't willing to act for herself, take what she nodded, she just kind of dragged everyone around her down and manipulated them, whereas Levin ends with the strong conviction to live as best as he can as he needs to. And it's impossible to not notice that the book ends focused on a completely happy family. A family apparently just like any other!
Tolstoy published the book after he was married for about a decade and had many of his children, so one would imagine that his ideas on the subjects inside are pretty valid too.
Sorry if this post was kind of sparse and unbalanced. This was the longest book I've done in a while and I was kind of out of practice. Also I'm on mad meds right now, haha. Anyways, it wasn't that bad. It was good, and though I think it's kind of ridiculous when book polls name in the number one book of all time (especially a magazine like Entertainment Weekly), it is really good. I'm still thinking like top three at the highest. I would recommend it, even if you don't have a lot of time on your hands, it's a relatively quick read (considering). It also helps to have a basic knowledge of Russian history; I had the good luck of having happened to have read a book on Russian history to about 1985 shortly before reading this, so I kind of knew about what Tolstoy was commenting on. Kind of. Anyways, next book, not sure, but hopefully I'll write about it when I can get off these horrible horse pills. See you all later!
Works Cited: Tolstoy, Leo. Anna Karenina. International Collectors Library: New York, 1944.
(Note on the edition: it's one of those awful ones that look really fancy and nice, but when you actually start reading it, you realize it's basically made out of cardboard. I call this the "Readers' Digest" version. Eugh...)
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