War And Peace: Leo Tolstoy (Penguin Classics)

War And Peace: Leo Tolstoy (Penguin Classics)

by Leo Tolstoy (Author), Anthony Briggs (Author), Leo Tolstoy (Author), Anthony Briggs (Author), Leo Tolstoy (Author)

Synopsis

Leo Tolstoy's "War and Peace" is a sprawling epic covering the impact of Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Russia on five different families. This "Penguin Classics" edition is translated with an introduction and notes by Anthony Briggs, with an afterword by Orlando Figes, author of "A People's Tragedy: Russian Revolution 1891-1924". At a glittering society party in St Petersburg in 1805, conversations are dominated by the prospect of war. Terror swiftly engulfs the country as Napoleon's army marches on Russia, and the lives of three young people are changed forever. The stories of quixotic Pierre, cynical Andrey and impetuous Natasha interweave with a huge cast, from aristocrats and peasants to soldiers and Napoleon himself. In "War and Peace", Tolstoy entwines grand themes - conflict and love, birth and death, free will and faith - with unforgettable scenes of nineteenth-century Russia, to create a magnificent epic of human life in all its imperfection and grandeur. Anthony Briggs' superb translation combines stirring, accessible prose with fidelity to Tolstoy's original, while Orlando Figes' afterword discusses the novel's vast scope and depiction of Russian identity. This edition also contains appendices, notes, a list of prominent characters and maps. Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) was born at Yasnaya Polyana, in central Russia. After marrying Sofya Behrs in 1862, Tolstoy settled down, managing his estates and writing two of his best-known novels, "War and Peace" (1869) and "Anna Karenina" (1878). In 1884 Tolstoy experienced a spiritual crisis, becoming an extreme moralist, rejecting the state, the church and private property. His last novel, "Resurrection" (1900), was written to raise money for the Doukhobor sect of Christian spiritualists. If you enjoyed "War and Peace", you might also like Fyodor Dostoyevsky's "The Brothers Karamazov". "A masterpiece...This new translation is excellent". (Anthony Beevor). "A book that you don't just read, you live". (Simon Schama).

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More Information

Format: Illustrated
Pages: 1440
Edition: Illustrated
Publisher: Penguin Classics
Published: 27 Sep 2007

ISBN 10: 0140447938
ISBN 13: 9780140447934

Media Reviews
There remains the greatest of all novelists--for what else can we call the author of War and Peace? --Virginia Woolf
Author Bio
Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) was born in Tula province and was educated privately and at Kazan University. In 1851 he went to the Caucasus, joined an artillery regiment & began his literary career. After marrying in 1862, he began writing War and Peace, which was finished in 1869. His second great work, Anna Karenina, was finished in 1876. Professor Tony Briggs is former Professor of Russian at the University of Birmingham, and is the author of six books on Russian literature. Professor Tony Briggs is former Professor of Russian at the University of Birmingham, has translated widely from the Russian, especially Pushkin, and is the author of several critical books on Russian literature. Orlando Figes is Professor of History at Birkbeck and the author of A People's Tragedy: The Russian Revolution, 1891-1924, which was awarded the Wolfson Prize for History and, most recently, Natasha's Dance: A Cultural History of Russia.