I just had the pleasure of reading Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy, for the second time in my life, so far. It took me a whole month to savor each and every word, but with so many wintery, gray days since Christmas, it was perfect timing. This is not a snack of a book, but a full course meal for the mind, heart and soul.
Some of you will be able to jump right in, but me, it was slow going because it had been so long, decades in fact, since I’ve read the book, that I had forgotten the characters had duplicate names. Depending on which character spoke, decided how the characters were referenced.
We open with a taste of Anna, her family, friends and Levin. We get a taste of Levin’s philosophical reflections that haunt his very soul and his deep desire to just find a good woman and settle down for a solid, moral life. We move on to the beautiful, fresh salad of Anna and her lovely status in society. Feeling almost full, we realize the main course is still to come and then Vronsky enters. The main entree is a hearty serving of the pleasure, despair and complexity of love, along with the bittersweet serving of high society living. Just when we think it is all over, we then return to Levin and his farm for dessert and the sweetness that life does offer.
Reading Tolstoy’s characters helps me identify, clarify and confirm who I am and what my beliefs are. Everything is woven together beautifully and because we know the thoughts of the characters, which reveal the complications of human thinking, we can easily identify certain struggles within ourselves, or those we know, or love. Strong characterization can’t help but reveal your own strengths and weaknesses as you read.
This is an excellent book for a group or book club read as there is so much to discuss in the way of politics, government, military, society, humanity and love. The tough decisions that have to be made by these characters, also indicate to me, that not much has changed in humanity really. Women’s rights of course have improved, but humanity itself and the complicated relationships we find ourselves in is just as messy today as it was for Anna and Vronsky. Society can still be savage, especially for those below the poverty line or of minority or “different” color or religion.
What really struck me as having the biggest change from Tolstoy’s time to the present day is the language people use. Serious topic conversations are no longer commonplace or revered like those from over a century ago. We are snookered into believing the “analysts” or “journalists” on television rather than discussing fact and deciding amongst ourselves at the dinner table. In fact rarely do we even all gather at the dinner table anymore. Today’s vocabulary and sentence framing has reduced down to simple phrases and slang. People often just resort to a single exclamation or expletive, or even just a button to show an emoji.
All this makes me ponder how long it will take for humanity to return to caveman dialogue of grunts and drawings on walls?
Wait…
I think we’ve already done that.
Shit.
😦
wholoctave 