Review - Anna Karenina

[wilderthan]

I was pretty excited to read Anna Karenina, given how much I loved War and Peace, and given that people assured me it'd be easier to get into and easier to read faster. Actually, I'm something of a freak, because I found War and Peace easier -- perhaps because I found it more interesting. Anna Karenina still does have a range of themes and characters, but War and Peace just had more of both. Also, there was a lot of history in War and Peace, and not so much in Anna Karenina. I'm not sure why that made me like the former better, since I'm not much for history and especially not Russian history. But there we are. Perhaps it was also that I didn't find the characters quite as compelling -- Levin, yes, but Kitty and Anna and Vronsky, not so much. They're very well written and realistic, particularly Anna herself, but I didn't get wrapped up in them.

In terms of the themes and techniques, Anna Karenina isn't lacking (unless you look only on the surface, and see only a tragic love affair). Some of it didn't hold much interest for me, such as Levin's thoughts on farming, but the contrasts between the city and the country are well done, and the contrast between Anna and Vronsky's relationship and Kitty and Levin's is quite well handled. The motif of the train is quite subtle, something I didn't notice until I read about it on wikipedia, but that was also quite interesting to note once I did realise.

When I say I didn't like Anna Karenina as much, it's not like I hated it. It's more like the difference between four stars on goodreads ("really liked it") and five ("it was amazing").

Comments

[samuraiter.livejournal.com]

The funny thing about each of Tolstoy's books is that he started hating them as soon as he was done with them. After he finished War & Peace, for example, he expressed utter disgust every time he was asked about it, and he said he'd never do one like that again, it wasn't representative of what he really wanted to do, etc. This is why his books are so different from each other. If you get a spare moment, I recommend trying The Death Of Ivan Ilyich; it's very short, but it's very different from what you've already seen.