Anna Karenina By Leo Tolstoy (1828 - 1910) Essays - Film, Fiction

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (1828 - 1910) Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy (1828 - 1910) Type of Work: Tragic love story Setting Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia; nineteenth century Principal Characters Robert Jordan, an American fighting with Spanish Loyalists Anna Karenina, a beautiful young woman Alexey, her cold, vindictive husband Count Vronsky, a young military officer who falls in love with Anna Stepan Oblonsky, Anna's spendthrift brother Dolly, Stepan's frustrated wife Kitty, Dolly's sister Levin, Stepan's rusticc friend, and Kitty's suitor Story Overveiw Stepan Oblonsky's wife Dolly had discovered that her husband was having an affair. With her beauty fading and her household a wreck, she had had enough. Stepan fretfully wrote to his sister, Anna Karenina, asking her to come to Moscow and convince Dolly not to leave him. Later, while working at his job in the entrenched Moscow bureaucracy, Stepan received an unexpected visitor: Levin, an old friend from the university, came to discuss Dolly's sister Kitty, whom he wanted to marry. After being informed by Stepan that he had a rival for Kitty's affections, a certain Count Vronskv of St. Petersburg, Levin resolved that he would propose to Kitty that very night. At that same moment, Anna and Count Vronsky were riding together in a train bound for Moscow. Vronsky noticed the charming woman as he made his way to the first-class compartment that he shared with his mother. He had time to take note of "the suppressed eagerness which played over her face" as their eyes met, and she remained in his mind. However, upon reaching their destination, the two went their separate ways - Anna to her brother's home, Vronsky and his mother to a hotel. Approached by Anna, Dolly at first refused to discuss her husband's infidelity. "Everything's lost after what has happened, evervthinq's over!" she raged. But finally she relented to Anna's plea to keep the family together. Meanwhile, Levin had arrived early at a dinner party hosted by the parents of Kitty and Dolly, determined to make his desires known to Kitty before the appearance of the rich and handsome Count. But "That cannot be ... forgive me," Kitty replied upon hearing his stammering proposal. Crushed by the rejection, Levin escaped from the gathering at the first opportunity. A few days later, at her coming-out ball, Kitty couldn't help but notice how Anna and Vronsky kept gazing at each other. Vronsky's face had a look that puzzled her . . . "like the expression of an intelligent dog when it had done wrong." It was clear to Kitty that the two were in love. Nevertheless, with her task of seeing to Stepan and Dolly completed, Anna boarded the next train for St. Petersburg. She thought of her son, Seryozha, and her husband, Alexey..... Mv life will go on in the old way, all nice and as usual ' "' she thought. But she found that she could not easily dismiss Count Vronsky from her mind. And stepping along the way, as Anna stepped out for a breath of air, there he was. "You know that I have come to be where you are; I can't help it," confessed the officer. Anna was both delighted and flattered by this, but it was simply unthinkable that anything could come of his attraction to her. After all, she was a married woman. Back in Moscow, Kitty was devastated. Not only had Count Vronsky spurned her, but Levin had also left the city to supervise work on his country estate. Humiliated and distraught, Kitty became so ill with despair that she was soon unable to eat or sleep. Her frantic parents, after finding no restorative medical treatment in Moscow, sent her to Europe to consult various doctors. Meanwhile, life for Anna in St. Petersburg remained strangely unsettled. The happiness that in Moscow "had fairly flashed from her eyes, [now seemed] hidden somewhere far away." To her further disquiet, the love-struck Vronsky took every opportunity to see her. One night she knelt and begged him to leave her in peace; but still he persisted: "I can't think of you and myself apart. You and I are one to me." And at that moment Anna "let her eyes rest on him, full of love." Soon afterward, Alexey Karenina walked into a party and found his wife with Vronsky; but Anna denied any impropriety. Still, she and Vronsky met night after night, with Alexey seemingly powerless or unwilling to stop them. Anna by now felt "so sinful, so guilty"; but still she could not curb her passion for the Count. The following summer, while staving at her husband's villa outside the city, Anna confronted her lover with an announcement: she was pregnant. Though he