Requiem for Len Weinglass

“It’s all there in Tolstoy,” Len told me as he lay dying last April. Stricken in the winter, lying now in a hospice in the Village, this would be his final spring. He was alert, watching the news of the Arab Spring, but was entering a deeper state where his friends could not go. When I asked if he was finding a spiritual meaning, he said he was reading War and Peace, adding, “It’s all there.” I didn’t get the page number in Tolstoy, and never saw him again.

Now, more than a year later, I was able to open War and Peace to the pages I believe Len was reading. These excerpts are to be shared with you all.