Realism & Victorian · Novel · 1869

War and Peace

Leo Tolstoy

Russian families move through Napoleonic war while Tolstoy argues with the idea of the great man. History happens in ballrooms and on frozen roads.

Historical novel

Characters

Heir and seeker whose clumsiness is a form of honesty.

Prince who wants a heroic death and finds something quieter.

Vitality itself, learning the costs of impulse and the uses of time.

Events exceed commanders; the novel is a theory of causation.

Private tables are where a country actually lives.

A sky-sign that characters read according to their need.

A tree that figures Andrei’s death and return to life.