Sítnikov*
Vasíly Lukích*
* Tutors to Serézha
Peter Ignátych, chief director of Serézha’s education
Nádenka, Lydia Ivánovna’s niece
Várya, Vrónsky’s sister-in-law
Mary Efímovna, nurse at Karénin’s
Princess Barbara Oblónskaya, Anna’s aunt
Kartásov*
Kartásova*
* People at the Opera
Princess Sorókina, a friend of Vrónsky’s mother
Vásenka Veslóvsky, a second cousin of the Shcherbátskys
Váska, a peasant boy
Mary Vlásevna, a midwife
Philip, Lévin’s coachman
Karl Fédorich, Vrónsky’s steward
Vasíly Seménich, a doctor on Vrónsky’s estate
Snetkóv, Michael Stepánich, an old Marshal of the Nobility
Nevédovsky, the new Marshal of the Nobility
Hlyústov, a district Marshal
Flérov, a member of the Nobility
Metrov, Peter Ivánovich, a professor
Bol, Peter Petróvich, an acquaintance of Lévin’s
Makhótin, a fellow-official of Lvov’s
Gágin, a visitor at the Club
Vorkúyev, Iván Petróvich, a publisher
Peter Dmítrich, a doctor
Michael*
Peter*
* Servants at Vrónsky’s
Landau, Count Bezzúbov, a Frenchman
Dmítry (‘Mítya’), Lévin’s son
Mikháylich, a beekeeper
Iván, Lévin’s coachman
Russian Words
Arshín, twenty-eight inches.
Chétvert, about five and three-quarters bushels.
Desyatína, about two and three-quarters acres.
Great Morskáya, one of the main streets in Petersburg.
Izvóshchik, a one-horse public conveyance which corresponds to our cab; also the cabdriver.
Kópek, the one-hundredth part of a rouble.
Kvas, a non-alcoholic drink.
Rouble, the basic unit of Russian currency.
Samovár, a ‘self-boiler’; a metal urn in customary use in Russia for heating water using coal or charcoal, usually for tea.
Sázhen, seven feet. Firewood is usually sold by the square sázhen. The logs are laid on one another to a height of one sázhen, the depth being twenty-one inches, which is the length of each log.
Tarantás, a large four-wheeled horse-drawn vehicle with a leather top. It rests on long wooden bars instead of springs, and is specially adapted for use where roads are bad.
Verst, two-thirds of a mile.
Zémstvo, nearly equivalent to County Council.
Books
Anna Karenina (Maude Translation)
Preface to the Maude Translation
Preface to the Maude Translation
ANNA KARENINA , the second of Tolstoy’s great novels, was begun in 1873 when he was forty-five, and its publication was completed in 1877, when he was passing through the spiritual crisis described in his Confession , a book for which the last chapters of Anna Karenina may serve as an introduction, and which was the next work he wrote.
Besides being a splendid novel, Anna Karenina is of great autobiographical value. It was Tolstoy’s way to put much of himself into his characters, but in none of them has he so frankly depicted himself as in Levin, the hero of this story. The description of Levin’s estate is largely drawn from Tolstoy’s own patrimony, Yasnaya Polyana. The character of the old servant, Agatha Mikhaylovna, is drawn from a retainer of his. Nicholas Levin is Tolstoy’s brother, Dmitry. The way in which Levin proposes to Kitty, by writing only the initial letters of the words he wants to say, was an incident in Tolstoy’s own courtship of his wife. Levin’s contempt for the Zemstvo (of which, like Tolstoy, he was a member for only a short time) expresses the author’s own feeling, as does Levin’s censure of the Russian Volunteers who joined in the struggle between Turkey and its Christian subjects in the days preceding the Russo-Turkish war of 1877.
On that matter Tolstoy opposed what appeared to be the