Great Short Works of Leo Tolstoy

by Leo Tolstoy, Aylmer Maude (Translator), Louise Maude (Translator)

Of all Russian writers Leo Tolstoy is probably the best known to the Western world, largely because of War and Peace, his epic in prose, and Anna Karenina, one of the most splendid novels in any language. But during his long lifetime Tolstoy also wrote enough shorter works to fill many volumes. Here reprinted in one volume are his eight finest short novels, together with "Alyosha the Pot", the little tale that Prince Mirsky described as "a masterpiece of rare perfection."

The Death of Ivan Ilych
The Cossacks
Family Happiness
The Devil
The Kreutzer Sonata
Master and Man
Father Sergius
Haji Murad
Alyosha the Pot

Genres: Classics, Fiction, Short Stories, Russia, Russian Literature, Literature, 19th Century

720 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1967

About the author

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Russian: Лев Николаевич Толстой; most appropriately used Liev Tolstoy; commonly Leo Tolstoy in Anglophone countries) was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist fiction. Many consider Tolstoy to have been one of the world's greatest novelists. Tolstoy is equally known for his complicated and paradoxical persona and for his extreme moralistic and ascetic views, which he adopted after a moral crisis and spiritual awakening in the 1870s, after which he also became noted as a moral thinker and social reformer.

His literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount, caused him in later life to become a fervent Christian anarchist and anarcho-pacifist. His ideas on nonviolent resistance, expressed in such works as The Kingdom of God Is Within You, were to have a profound impact on such pivotal twentieth-century figures as Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Reviews

[Ted · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hadji Murad ... has something in common, on the one hand, with Shakespeare's plays of power and fate, and on the other, with such a corrosively perceptive study of colonialism as Conrad's Heart of Darkness. The episode itself dates from Tolstoy's own early years in the Caucasus, when Shamil, the Moslem religious leader, was trying to unite the Caucasian tribes against the Russian annexation.


from John Bailey's Introduction



This is a tremendous collection of stories by Tolstoy. Don't be fooled, "short works" does not mean they are "short stories", rather they are more like novellas. Although the last story, Alyosha The Pot, is only seven pages long, the other eight stories provide over 650 pages of great reading. (The Cossacks alone is 150 pages.)

I read them all a few years ago and enjoyed every one of them. I would have to reread them to remember my favorites (which I may well do), but one that I remember particularly is Master and Man, about a well-off merchant and one of his laborers, who set out together in a horse-drawn sled on a winter afternoon, a couple hours before nightfall.



"Half the sky was hidden by a lowering dark cloud. In the yard it was quiet, but in the street the wind was felt more keenly. The snow swept down from a neighboring shed and whirled about in the corner near the bath-house." What a mood setter!

Besides the stories already mentioned, the collection contains Family Happiness, The Death of Ivan Ilych, The Devil, The Kreutzer Sonata, and Father Sergius. The translations are by Louise and Aylmer Maude, and John Bayley's ten page Introduction is very informative. (Bayley wrote The Order of Battle at Trafalgar, a book that contains many wonderful essays on Russian literature.)



. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Previous review: Glory Road
Next review: Heart of Darkness
More recent review: SAGA Vol. 1

Previous library review: Oblomov
Next library review: Anna Karenina

[El · Rating 5 out of 5]

ETA: I'm a little confused by the number of reviews that claim these works aren't "short" as the title indicates. Have you read War and Peace or Anna Karenina? Those are loooong. These are short.

Family Happiness (1859): A young girl falls in love with a much older man; the story follows their relationship from the start of their love, when things are always gooey-heart-shaped-eyeballs-for-each-other through their marriage, when Mashechka realizes that love and marriage isn't quite it's all cracked up to be. The Mountain Goats song by the same name took its title from the Tolstoy story and mentions Tolstoy in the song as well. (In case anyone else is nerdy about music and literary references like I am.)

Cattiness! (Page 67):

I recognized the voices: the speakers were the Italian marquis and a French friend of his whom I knew also. They were talking of me and of Lady S., and the Frenchman was comparing us as rival beauties... I was already a mother, while Lady S. was only nineteen; though I had the advantage in hair, my rival had a better figure.

The Cossacks (1852-1862): Mr. Richy-pants, Dmitri Olenin, joins the Russian army in hopes to have some adventure because that's what Richy-pant types of people tend to do to give their life some meaning. In the middle of nowhere in the Caucasus he realizes that his previous standing means zippola - hello, wake-up call. Still, he falls in love with a Cossack girl despite the glaring differences in their social standing, but he has to contend with her fiance.

What I learned: I wasn't familiar with the term abreks and had to look it up. In simple terms it seems they were your run-of-the-mill mountain bandits. In El-terms I like to think of them as Russian ninjas.

The Death of Ivan Ilych (1886): To summarize: A high-court judge (Ivan Ilych) hangs some curtains one day, falls and hurts himself, and soon thereafter believes he is dying. The moral of the story: Go with Venetian blinds. Forget the curtains.

If you think that's seriously the moral of the story you probably shouldn't be reading this review. In a nutshell, it's awesome. Please read it. All of you. It affected me in the same way reading Franny and Zooey affected me, for sort of the same reason. Which is funny because I'm not religious. At all.

(Listed on the 1,001 Books to Read Before You Kick the Bucket list.)


The Devil (1889): You know a story is going to be good when it starts out with a lengthy quote from the Bible. This story is about sex and eeeeviiiiil. Basically.

More cattiness! (Page 306):

It is generally supposed that Conservatives are usually old people, and that those in favour of change are the young. That is not quite correct. Usually Conservatives are young people: those who want to live but who do not think about how to live, and have not time to think, and therefore take as a model for themselves a way of life that they have seen.

The Kreutzer Sonata (1889): Girls, if you're cheating on your boyfriend/husband and you think your boyfriend/husband has an inkling as to what is happening behind his back, do not gift him a copy of The Kreutzer Sonata for Christmas.

Also, thanks to my buddy Alex for the reminder - it's extra great to read the latter portion while listening to the music.

(Listed on the 1,001 Books to Read Before You Kick the Bucket list.)


Master and Man (1895): A fantastic survival-in-the-snowy-Russian-woods kind of story and not at all about this even though they both feature the name Nikita.

Father Sergius (1898): What do you do when you find out the day before your wedding that your fiancee is sleeping with the Tsar? You run off and become a monk, of course! But there's that whole temptation and doubt thing to contend with, yada yada yada. The story itself reminds me of one of the stories out of The Decameron actually, and I wonder if Tolstoy was paying homage.


(From the film based on the story, 1918.)

Hadji Murad (1904): Possibly one of the most intense stories I've ever read. It's like The Iliad but, y'know, Russian. Dude's cheek hangs off his face at one point, and he holds it in place with his hand while fighting with his other hand. Wicked crazy. I'm actually sort of speechless about this one. For some reason going into it I didn't think I'd enjoy it at all. Glad I didn't skip it. (Yeah, like I'm capable of doing that anyway.)

Alyosha the Pot (1905): I can't believe I've never read this story before considering how short and sweet it is. (Okay, not exactly sweet.) Find it online and read it. Seriously, it's short and awesome.


As a whole this collection rocked my face. I don't think there was a single story I didn't care for - even the ones I cared about less than the others are better than some other writers' entire oeuvre. What's nice about this collection is the stories/novellas are in order of publication date so you see the kind of writer Tolstoy was at the beginning and how his interests had changed over the years - particularly after his moral crisis and "conversion" in 1878.

The Chronology in the back points out the years 1908-1909 as being especially important: "Quarrels of Tolstoy with his wife. Tolstoy keeps Secret Diary." Secret Diary? I'm there! Must. Find.

I know I was pretty excited about Chekhov after reading The Portable Chekhov and all, but Tolstoy just kicked his ass.

[Shuhan Rizwan · Rating 5 out of 5]

শুধু 'ফাদার সের্গেই' গল্পটার জন্যেই অগণিত তারা দাগানো যায় এই বইটাকে...

[Jay · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book worth its weight in gold.


1) Hadji Murat (1912)
2) The Death of Ivan Ilych (1886)
3) Master & Man (1895)
4) The Cossacks (1863)

5) The Kreutzer Sonata (1889)
6) Family Happiness (1859)
7) The Devil (1889)

8) Alyosha the Pot (1905)
9) Father Sergius (1898)

[James Lydon · Rating 3 out of 5]

- The Death of Ivan Ilyich: 5/5. Everyone should read this. Tempus Fugit. Memento Mori.
- Family Happiness: 4/5. What happens when the honeymoon phase is over? Tolstoy offers his predictions.
- The Cossacks: 1/5. Boring. Didn’t really seem to have a point.
- The Devil: 3/5. He needs to read Theology of the Body. Too bad Tolstoy lived before JPII.
- The Kreutzer Sonata: 3/5. What happens when desire turns into resentment? “‘All I’ve ever learned from love is how to shoot at someone who outdrew you.’ - Pentatonix” - Leo Tolstoy
- Master and Man: 4/5. Quite a lovely story.
- Father Sergius: 3/5. Interesting thought experiment.
- Alyosha the Pot: 4/5. I had no idea you could write such a moving story in 7 pages.

Weighted Average: 3.1/5 Stars

[Andy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tolstoy is such a great writer it’s almost depressing. Like ok everyone stop writing, someone said what you’re trying to say more artfully, profoundly and honestly like 170 years ago.

Reading how familiar his characters’ experiences and inner conflicts are to us in the 21st century manifests the reality that there are fundamentally human experiences that cross time, geography and culture. It humanizes history in a way that I think reading non fiction is unable to.

It can also feel exhausting. Like jeez, humans are incorrigible! We just keep doing the same stupid stuff!

Also some parts of our life today are just not as “modern” or unique as we imagine. Just because we’re experiencing something for the first time doesn’t mean there isn’t hundreds of years of meditations on that experience.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an excellent introduction to works of Tolstoy for anyone who is interested in the author but unsure if reading his lengthy novels is a worthwhile investment or to those who have read the novels and just want to see what else there is to Tolstoy. Having read the novels and religious/political works of Tolstoy first, this collection provided an enjoyable continuation of many of the same themes in a different format. The editor's choice of the selected stories and quality of translation are beyond criticism. The only thing it could benefit from is translation of foreign (mainly french) language used in the notes.

[Andrés Astudillo · Rating 5 out of 5]

This one, is an essential book, if you want to know about Tolstoy. In this book, you get to deeply know the different styles of this author, and you confirm that he is much more than War and Peace, and Anna Karenina. There are many styles, such as: historical fiction, romance (not the stupid, typical one in which both of them live forever above a rainbow, NO), short novels, and philosophy. In this book you get a glance of everything, and you are deeply involved with every character that takes place in each one of the 680 pages.
The book includes 8 short stories, and are in chronological order, that includes a bibliography, introduction and a resume of his life.

[Tyler · Rating 1 out of 5]

Do not buy this book. The Maude translation of Tolstoy's works is exceptionally bad. My rating is for the translation, not the merit of Tolstoy's stories. As best I can, let me rate them separately below:

Family Happiness -- (*) -- I didn't care for this story because Tolstoy writes it from a female perspective, and he doesn't quite carry it off. This is an early work of his, an idealized portrait of how love and marriage might proceed.

The Cossacks -- (***) -- A short work of about 120 pages asking whether someone from one culture can ever really "go native" in another. A little comic and sad, but with good natural descriptions and a study of the Cossack culture.

The Death of Ivan Ilych -- (****) -- Tolstoy's best short work with an existentialist ring.

The Devil -- (**) -- A man's sexual past catches up with him with a vengeance. This story was a little too short and thin for me.

The Kreutzer Sonata -- (***) -- A well structured, controversial story using a frame narrative to describe of the failure of marriage in the 19th century, stemming from the terribly misplaced sexual attitudes of the time. The story traces out the disastrous consequences in the relations between one couple and really pulls readers in.

Master and Man -- (***) -- A look at the relations between servants and those they serve.

Father Sergius -- (***) -- A story of a nobleman's quest for authentic service to his fellow man. This story was much better than I expected.

Hadji Murad -- (***) -- Tolstoy's best, a look at the life of Chechen warlord trying to go over to the Russians in a quest for vengeance. The story is one that will appeal to American readers for its wildness and bravado.

Alyosha the Pot -- (**) -- Good story, but much too short.


I bought this Perennial Classics collection because it had most of Tolstoy's best stories together between its covers. I advise others not to make the same mistake, and to read these stories in other books. Without belaboring the details, let me repeat that the translation is wretched. Again, do not buy this book.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

This review is of the stories "Father Sergius", "The Devil", and "Alyosha the Pot". I'd read the other stories before in a separate collection which is also on a bookshelf here on goodreads. Of those stories, "The Cossacks", "The Kreutzer Sonata", and "Master and Man" rank among my favorite stories of all time both for enjoyment of the content as well as appreciation for their artistic boldness and creativity. Of the stories being reviewed here, "The Devil" and "Alyosha the Pot" were the better two of the three, particularly the latter in its almost Hemingway-esque brevity and subtle suggestiveness. It's only 5 pages long where a "short work" of Tolstoy can be anywhere from 50-200 pages. Yet, it was almost as profound as "The Devil" which, in spite of some of its long-windedness packs a philosophical punch at the end that leaves the reader dazed for at least a quarter of an hour, if not more. "Father Sergius" was a tad too moralistically sentimental for my taste: Tolstoy falls too often in the 19th century (although the story was written at the tail-end of it) trap of long-winded explanation as opposed to artistic demonstration. Yet, as dated as Tolstoy's style can be (speaking now of his writing as a whole), his ideas and insights are as fresh as if you'd thought them yesterday.

[Banbury · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is more of an essay than a review, and it discusses only one story in the collection.

The Time of Ivan's Life

The Death of Ivan Ilych both begins and ends with the death of its title character. In between, the story is told chronologically both backward and forward. At the beginning, his death is announced, his final days of illness and agony discussed, his colleagues and family members introduced, and his funeral accomplished. Time then shifts and there is an outline of the progression of his early years, his education, his early career, his marriage, and the raising of his children. As he graduates from school and leaves his father’s house, he is looking forward in time with anticipated success, as indicated when he buys a watch and has the fob inscribed with the Latin phrase, “respice finem” (“look to the end”) (p. 256). His later major career promotion and its concomitant relocation to a larger house and his care over its furnishing are set forth in greater detail, and the progress is both chronological and up the social ladder, represented concretely by the step-ladder he mounts to hang the curtains in his new house. However, it was that very step up that causes him to slip and bang his hip on a knob, leading to the injury that ultimately kills him. The top of that step-ladder represents the apogee of his success, and is the beginning of his physical decline. The chronology remains forward, as we follow the “progress of his disease.” (p. 273 ). Yet for Ivan Ilych, as his illness worsens, time also moves backwards:

Pictures of his past rose before him one after another. They always began with what was nearest in time and then went back to what was most remote—to his childhood—and rested there.

(p. 297). But contrary to what one might expect, the memories of his childhood are not pleasant ones for him. The memories are so “painful” that he would will himself back to the present—to contemplating the button on the back of the sofa. Id. But it is not that his childhood was bad that pained him, it was the recognition that he had lived his life poorly. He compares the progress of his life to the progress of his illness:

Then again together with that chain of memories another series passed through his mind—of how his illness had progressed and grown worse. There also the further back he looked the more life there had been. There had been more of what was good in life and more of life itself. The two merged together. ‘Just as the pain went on getting worse, so my life grew worse and worse,’ he thought. ‘There is one bright spot there at the back, at the beginning of life, and afterwards all becomes blacker and blacker and proceeds more and more rapidly--in inverse ratio to the square of the distance from death,’ [footnote 1] thought Ivan Ilych.

Id. Thus the concept of “progress” is made ironic—while it clearly means movement, it is not always clear in which direction one’s progress is leading. The “progress” of Ivan Ilych’s illness is leading him to death. However, Tolstoy’s seeming contradictions are not limited to one layer of meaning—Ivan Ilych’s impending death is what eventually leads him to a real (if brief) ability to live. The blending of the concepts of life and death were adumbrated in the phrase on his watch fob, the double meaning of “the end” that he was most likely unaware when he had it engraved, as well as the description of Ivan Ilych as “le phenix de la famille.” (p. 255). The phoenix, of course, is known not only for a splendid rising from the ashes, but also for the necessity of its death.
Ivan Ilych also recoils from looking to the future, which he knows will bring him death. He tries to go on with his former activities that had once “screened” (p. 281) thoughts of death from him, but sooner or later, the pain in his side would gnaw at him, and he would once again be confronted with his own impending death. He simply refuses to accept it. He begins his final three days of profound pain with the words “I won’t!” (p. 301). With this, Ivan Ilych feels he is struggling against being pushed into a black bag, and terrified of the death he knows he cannot avoid. He believes his pain is caused by his inability properly to get into the black hole. He knows that difficulty is caused by his refusal to admit his life had not been lived properly. Finally, he feels struck in the chest and side, and the shock of that pain somehow allows him to admit about his life, “Yes, it was not the right thing.” Id. He then feels himself slipping into the black hole, and seeing a light at the bottom. Once again we find that it is not always clear in which direction Ivan Ilych is moving. Of course the black hole represents death, but just as clearly it represents a kind of rebirth, where there is a light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak.[Footnote 2] Ivan Ilych uses the metaphor of a railway carriage to explicate the confusion of his direction:

What had happened to him was like the sensation one sometimes experiences in a railway carriage when one thinks one is going backwards while one is really going forwards and suddenly becomes aware of the real direction.

Id. But his insight is more than just that his life had been lived in the wrong way. He also found the right way; he had to repent his own bad acts, and try to make things better for others. He does this when he says he is sorry to his son and his wife, and waives them out of the room in order to spare them having to watch his agonies. He then looks for the pain, but no longer finds it. He looks for his accustomed fear of death, and it is gone. With his dying, he finds he has conquered death—“’Death is finished,’ he said to himself. ‘It is no more!’” (p.302). Ivan Ilych dies at the end of the story.
The circular structure of this story means the end of the story brings us back to the beginning, and upon re-reading, we see the entire story is encapsulated in the first few paragraphs. Ivan Ilych’s death is announced during a break in a legal trial, where Ivan Ilych’s colleagues are socializing and relaxing, just as Ivan Ilych had done before his illness. When they hear of his death, they immediately think about how their own career appointments will be affected. Ivan Ilych had been no different:

In the intervals between the sessions he smoked, drank tea, chatted a little about politics, a little about general topics, a little about cards, but most of all about official appointments.

(p. 267, emphasis added). Having read the entire story, we now understand the terrible phoniness of the obituary. If his wife suffers “profound sorrow” (p. 247) at his death, we know it is only because she will be deprived of his salary. He was not her “beloved husband;” Id., rather, “she hated him.” (p. 270). [Footnote 3] His so-called friends feel put out by the obligation to attend his funeral. His closest friend is named Peter Ivanovich. The patronymic suggests he is in some sense the son of Ivan Ilych. Certainly he acts just as Ivan Ilych would have if their positions had been reversed. He does his duty, but when confronted with Ivan Ilych’s dead body, he refuses to admit that death has anything to do with him, and turns away:

Besides this there was in that expression a reproach and a warning to the living. This warning seemed to Peter Ivanovich out of place, or at least not applicable to him. He felt a certain discomfort and so he hurriedly crossed himself once more and turned and went out of the door—too hurriedly…

(p. 250). This scene reminds us of the passage where Ivan Ilych refuses to see how death is anything more than an abstraction set forth in the old syllogism that Caius is a man, men are mortal, therefore, Caius is mortal. Despite the logic, Ivan Ilych refuses to see his own mortality. He thinks that while it was right for Caius to die, for him, “little Vanya, Ivan Ilych, …it’s altogether a different matter.” (p. 280).
Also like Ivan Ilych, Peter Ivanovich seeks to distract himself from thoughts of his own mortality by his usual distracting activities. After turning away from the dead body, he finds his colleague, Schwartz, in the next room. “The mere sight of that playful, well-groomed, and elegant figure refreshed Peter Ivanovich.” (p. 250). Schwartz is planning a card game, and does not see any reason for the death of Ivan Ilych to intrude upon his fun. The only reason Peter Ivanovich does not immediately join Schwartz, is that Ivan Ilych’s widow intercepts him, and he is obligated by duty to attend the funeral service. During the service, he kept himself from looking at the dead body, and refused to give in to “any depressing influence.” (p. 254). He is the first to leave the service, and he catches up with Schwartz and the card game. But while Peter Ivanovich thinks he is fleeing death, we know he cannot, and Schwartz’s name (it is German for “Black”) lets us know that the black bag is in Peter Ivanovich’s future, as it was for Ivan Ilych. Thus, although not in the narrative, we are aware that the story will repeat itself with Peter Ivanovich-- although it is not clear that Peter Ivanovich will find the final redemption at the end of his life.

Footnote 1: A theory of relativity that we all understand as we get older.

Footnote 2: That light is reminiscent of the “bright spot there at the back, at the beginning of life” (p. 297) that he was aware of when he contemplated his childhood. In this story, there is a certain identity between birth and death.

Footnote 3: Lest we judge Ivan Ilych’s wife too harshly for her lack of sympathy for her husband, it should be remembered it was he who first failed to support her when she was pregnant, and found ways to avoid her when her needs interfered with his ease.

[Joe Pratt · Rating 4 out of 5]

The biggest impact this collection of short stories had on me was the desire it gave me to write more. I’m not sure if it was Tolstoy’s words or the season of life I’m in but it seems to me that writing would be a great way to clear my mind, reduce anxieties, and become a better person.

I enjoyed all the short stories in this collection except Hadji Muradi - which felt uncharacteristically shallow for Tolstoy. It was like reading one of those cheap adventure stories set in a far away place where a lot of excitement happens but not much that’s meaningful.

But the rest were great. “Family Happiness” and “Father Sergius” were particularly compelling. I think every married person should read the former and everyone period should read the latter. The former was all about how happiness is married life has less to do with romantic love (indeed, Tolstoy seems to suggest it has nothing to do with that) and everything to do with mutual respect, friendship, communication, and a willingness to sacrifice for your spouse.

“Father Sergius” was even better. It dealt with man’s ability to change himself and become a new creature in Christ. I saw bits of myself in Father Sergius and loved how, in the story, God is able to make him whole despite of, and even through, his bad decisions. Super moving story.

“Master and Man” was equally hopeful about our ability to change and become better and it was probably my third favorite.

I’ve read “The Death of Ivan Ilych” before and liked it again. “The Cossacks” and “Alyosha the Pot” both tugged at my heartstrings and made me feel sad in a good way (avoid those stories if you don’t like sad things).

“The Devil” and, even more so, “The Kreutzer Sonata,” were a bit disturbing and I got less spiritual nourishment out of them then the others. Not sure I’ll ever go back to them but they were interesting nonetheless.

[Blake Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

genius

[Kevin · Rating 2 out of 5]

I disliked most of these and did not finish several of them. Also, they’re not all short! Some very long and boring. Sorry!

[Chris Pratt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tolstoy has a singular ability to capture viscerally the most poignant feelings and quiet, private moments and thoughts.

It’s crazy how big of an effect the ending of a book has on my opinion of it. The final 5% of a book punches well above its weight and largely determines how much I like it. That was made very clear to me while reading these stories. I’m a sucker for a happy, inspiring ending. There’s something inspiring about that idea—no matter how often I feel like I’m failing or that I’m not enough, I need not get discouraged. This isn’t the end, and time has a way of making things right. God has a way of making things right.



Family Happiness (5/5)
This story is a beautiful example of what Jesus Christ meant when he referred to himself as the bridegroom. As a disciple of Christ I long to be with him, and that longing causes my very nature to change, even as Másha’s love of Sergei changed her desires, actions, and the way she viewed the world and those around her.

What a guy.
- After Sergei’s first visit, “it seemed quite plain and simple: the proper object of life was happiness, and I promised myself much happiness ahead. It seemed as if our gloomy old house had suddenly become full of light and life.”
- “There was another thing which displeased me at first and then became pleasant to me. This was his complete indifference and even contempt for my personal appearance. … But I soon understood what he wanted. He wished to make sure that I had not a trace of affectation. And when I understood this I was really quite free from affectation…”
- “He was right in saying that the only certain happiness in life is to live for others. … by degrees this became a conviction with me, without thinking about it. … The mere sight of him made everything begin to speak and press for admittance to my heart, filling it with happiness.”

I admire Sergei so much, but I wonder how the story would have looked if he hadn’t succumbed to the smallness of self-pity and contempt for his wife. The depth of mature love is magnified by the foil of passionate love in Family Happiness, but I like to think that the transition can possibly be sweeter and less painful.

The story of life is the story of learning to give your heart to someone besides yourself. Those who end up truly happy are those whose hearts end up turned completely outwards. Even the most gregarious person grows pitifully small if their time is spent fulfilling their own desires and seeking out their own pleasures. We spend so much time securing a particular future for ourselves, and to be mindful of future cares is certainly better than to be mindful only of the present ones, but there comes a time in life when the future isn’t a given. Maybe old age is important because it forces us to adopt a lily-like lack of anxiety regarding the future. And maybe a precocious adoption of that mindset is the key to real happiness.

Highlights
- “Between services I used to read the gospel; and the book became more and more intelligible to me, and the story of that divine life simpler and more touching; and the depths of thought and feeling I found in studying it became more awful and impenetrable.”
- “I have found what is needed for happiness. A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbour—such is my idea of happiness. And then, on the top of all that, you for a mate, and children, perhaps—what more can the heart of man desire?”



The Cossacks (2/5)
Olénin is that part of me that is unable to commit seriously enough to anything to find abiding happiness. He stumbles across the sublime in nature and in the idea of living for others and in Maryánka, but they provide only a temporary, shallow distraction from the malaise that ultimately defines him.

“I then see before me those obtuse faces, those rich eligible girls whose looks seem to say: ‘It's all right, you may come near though I am rich and eligible’—and that arranging and rearranging of seats, that shameless match-making and that eternal tittle-tattle and pretence; those rules—with whom to shake hands, to whom only to nod, with whom to converse (and all this done deliberately with a conviction of its inevitability), that continual ennui in the blood passing on from generation to generation. Try to understand or believe just this one thing: you need only see and comprehend what truth and beauty are, and all that you now say and think and all your wishes … for yourselves will fly to atoms! Happiness is being with nature, seeing her, and conversing with her. ‘He may even (God forbid) marry a common Cossack girl, and be quite lost socially’ I can imagine them saying of me with sincere pity! Yet the one thing I desire is to be quite ‘lost’ in your sense of the word. I wish to marry a Cossack girl, and dare not because it would be a height of happiness of which I am unworthy.”



The Death of Iván Ilých (4/5)
A whirlwind journey through the life of a man who became pitifully small due to his chronic self-absorption. The deathbed redemption of Iván Ilých is beautiful and reminiscent of the closing scene of East of Eden. I believe in a God who can redeem the darkest and smallest of people, and I think His tool for doing so is what we call life (which, in Iván Ilých’s case, meant a prolonged and painful illness).

This story begs the reader to ask the question “What do I want? What do I really want out of my life?” If you avoid deeply engaging with this question, you risk echoing Iván Ilých: “It is as if I had been going downhill while I imagined I was going up. And that is really what it was. I was going up in public opinion, but to the same extent life was ebbing away from me. And now it is all done and there is only death.”

“The syllogism he had learnt from Kiesewetter's Logic: 'Caius is a man, men are mortal, therefore Caius is mortal,' had always seemed to him correct as applied to Caius, but certainly not as applied to himself. That Caius—man in the abstract—was mortal, was perfectly correct, but he was not Caius, not an abstract man, but a creature quite separate from all others. He had been little Vanya, with a mamma and a papa, with Mitya and Volódya, with the toys, a coachman and a nurse, afterwards with Kátenka and with all the joys, griefs, and delights of childhood, boyhood, and youth. What did Caius know of the smell of that striped leather ball Vanya had been so fond of? Had Caius kissed his mother's hand like that, and did the silk of her dress rustle so for Caius? Had he rioted like that at school when the pastry was bad? Had Caius been in love like that? Could Caius preside at a session as he did? 'Caius really was mortal, and it was right for him to die; but for me, little Ványa, Iván Ilých, with all my thoughts and emotions, it's altogether a different matter. It cannot be that I ought to die. That would be too terrible. … If I had to die like Caius I should have known it was so. An inner voice would have told me so, but there was nothing of the sort in me and I and all my friends felt that our case was quite different from that of Caius.’”



The Devil (1/5)
A devil of a book. I thought for certain there would be another Ilých-esque redemption in the alternative ending. He seemed to tee such an ending up with a desperate prayer to God for salvation and then totally whiffed. It was naive of me to be surprised at such an ending, knowing it was written by a realist like Tolstoy.



The Kreutzer Sonata (1/5)
Jeffrey R. Holland once said of his wife Pat, “[After 37 years of marriage] I know her likes and dislikes, and she knows mine. I know her tastes and interests, hopes and dreams, and she knows mine. As our love has grown and our relationship has matured, we have been increasingly free with each other about all of that.
The result is that I know much more clearly now how to help her, and, if I let myself, I know exactly what will hurt her. In the honesty of our love—love that can’t truly be Christlike without such total devotion—surely God will hold me accountable for any pain I cause her by intentionally exploiting or hurting her when she has been so trusting of me, having long since thrown away any self-protection in order that we could be, as the scripture says, ‘one flesh.’”

Pózdnyshev, the protagonist of The Kreutzer Sonata, didn’t last 37 years with his wife, but he certainly knew exactly what would hurt her. A sad little story of a misguided man who lets the inevitable little barbs and pinpricks of marriage grow into full-blown stabs of jealousy and random rage.



Master and Man (5/5)
“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his lifefor his friends.”

Another good story itself redeemed by its depiction of redemption. I appreciate having another symbol of Christ—and a symbol so real and tangible as Tolstoy is able to write so well—to invite me to come closer to Him.

“Nikíta kept him warm from below and his fur coats from above. Only his hands, with which he kept his coat-skirts down round Nikita's sides, and his legs which the wind kept uncovering, began to freeze, especially his right hand which had no glove. But he did not think of his legs or of his hands but only of how to warm the peasant who was lying under him. He looked out several times at Mukhórty and could see that his back was uncovered and the drugget and breeching lying on the snow, and that he ought to get up and cover him, but he could not bring himself to leave Nikíta and disturb even for a moment the joyous condition he was in. He no longer felt any kind of terror.
'No fear, we shan't lose him this time!' he said to himself, referring to his getting the peasant warm with the same boastfulness with which he spoke of his buying and selling.”



Father Sergius (4/5)
Father Sergius’ inner turmoil is so relatable. At times I feel like no good thing I’ve ever done will be of any use in the next life because, in the words of the Savior, “I have my reward.” I might not be doing things to be seen of men (then again, I might be), but often it seems my goal is to be seen of me. That repetitive story in my life often ends like Father Sergius’: with a renewed desire to find God (“I will now seek Him!”) and the naturally attendant desire to serve my fellow men. “When he succeeded in helping people … he did not wait to see their gratitude but went away directly afterwards. And little by little God began to reveal Himself within him.”

Highlights
- “He thought himself a shining light, and the more he felt this the more was he conscious of a weakening, a dying down of the divine light of truth that shone within him.”
- “There is no God for the man who lives, as I did, for human praise.”



Hadji Murád (2/5)
“Cold art Thou, O Death, yet I was thy Lord and thy Master!
My body sinks fast to the earth, my soul to Heaven flies faster.”



Alyosha the Pot (4/5)
I wish I could be as simple as Alyosha. Having sustained a fatal injury, his thoughts went immediately to his father. Then, in response to Ustinja’s query about the seriousness of his injury, Alyosha said “We’ll, we don’t all live forever. It must be some time. Thank you, dear Ustinja, for feeling sorry for me. See, it’s better they didn’t let us marry, for nothing would have come of it. And now all is fine.” No ambition, no feeling of despair or injustice at his premature death, just gratitude.

“In his heart he felt that if he was good here, if he obeyed and did not offend, then there all would be well.”

tendentious, cracknel, lour, cambric, burdock, salver, rime, redolent, chiffonier, rusk, irascible, verst, crupper, turbid, inure, gable, burnish, pilau, accoutrement, bivouac, daw, cretonne, sinecure, milliner, comme il faut, querulous, vermiform, somnolent, commode, auscultation, coverlet, mien, recrudescence, gourmandize, trousseau, cavil, efface, ingratiate, forelock, drugget, tonsure, abstemious, biretta, ambo, chasuble, knout, bier, neurasthenic, plait, nosegay, campanula, vetch, scabious, sloe, ewer, roan, carroty, major-domo, epaulet, ombre, giaour, parvenu, blackguard, domino (cloak), insensate, seraglio, pastern

[Ali · Rating 5 out of 5]

No one knows human psychology like Tolstoy does!

[Dia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not sure how to review a collection of stories. Am I commenting on the stories themselves, or on the editors' choices -- which stories they included, the value of the Introduction, and other such choices? So I've mixed all such considerations together and pulled four stars out of my furry ushanka hat. One factor that diminished my rating is simply the poor quality of the print in this particular book. The ink is thick and blobby on many of the rather flimsy pages. I shouldn't have been so cheap in purchasing Tolstoy's great short works -- I will want to own these works for my lifetime, and I'm sure you will too, so don't skimp like I did.

On the other hand, perhaps it is more fitting to not get the deluxe edition of Tolstoy's great short works. Surely Hadji Murad did not spend his rubles on fancily bound books. It was nothing in Ivan Illyich's library that redeemed him in his last minutes. And likewise, both "Master" and "Man" were able to act out of truth not because of a treasured book they'd owned but because of...divine inspiration? Sudden insight into their own and others' true nature? An abrupt shifting of perspective away from small self to vastness? However one wishes to phrase it, these heroes of Tolstoy's great short works didn't do their pivotal acts out of intellectual understanding; more importantly, they didn't do them out of habit; and most importantly, Tolstoy somehow actually isn't moralizing about all this, at all. -- Or, if he is, he somehow gets away with it, without alienating moralizing-phobic readers like myself.

Perhaps its a sign of our degenerate times that we would even need such stories as these to contemplate, in order to be closer to truth. But we do -- there is so much nontruth pulling at us, screaming for our attention, pleading with us to accept and repeat its litanies. We certainly don't need to develop peasant-envy, but we do need to let ourselves get as close as we can stand to be to what is certain and what is fresh about being alive. It's evident that Tolstoy longed to be as close as he could be to life, and that he must have contemplated the essential truths of life (that we keep going for pleasure and trying to avoid pain, that we get sick, that we die) consistently for many years, all the while not missing out on any of the details that make those truths flesh and blood.

So to read his stories (especially the three I referenced above -- there are a couple stories in this collection that I can't rave about) is to sort of have someone do the work for you -- he lays bare the condensed fruit of his contemplations (now that's a weird mixed metaphor, but I can't think of how other to say it). We just sit in bed or wherever and read his work, which seems very second-hand -- but actually, reading these stories isn't painless. Ivan Illyich is not for hypochondriacs! Master and Man is not for the judgmental, and Hadji Murad is not for sissies. So gather your courage, open your mind, do spend money on a nice copy, and read your Tolstoy!

[Lb Song · Rating 5 out of 5]

The marvel of Tolstoy is his instinctive grasp of the desperate choices humans face in life.

He has an uncanny skill in both portraying our ability to love and hate, as well as our motivations and fears. When reading his stories, I often feel myself completely succumbing to his world, as if I’ve known the characters my whole life. The deep emotional and intellectual resonance of his works stay with me long after I close the pages.

Such a work is The Death of Ivan Ilych, a short story published in 1886.

In it, the reader can see the roots of the moral questions that Tolstoy himself will wrestle with his whole life. The primary question being: what is a good life?

For Ivan Ilych, he had answered this question by leading a life that was, “the most simple and most ordinary and therefore most terrible”. A dutiful Russian bureaucrat, his navigated life by relying on the good sense of society to decide what was proper. His chief pleasure came from a sense of his own power over inferiors, and secondary pleasures from playing bridge and indulging in bourgeoisie tastes at home.

Yet throughout this innocent ascendance in social position, there were cracks that betrayed a denial of the truth underneath the life of “legality, correctitude, and propriety”. The truth at last manifested itself in the form of physical and psychological pain, plaguing him endlessly and making life more miserable than death. Faced with this curse and sensing death’s close presence, Ivan Ilych began to wonder, “What if my whole life had been wrong?”.

Ilych looked backed at his life, and realized suddenly, “all that for which he had lived- and saw clearly that it was not real at all, but a terrible and huge deception which had hidden both life and death. This consciousness intensified his physical suffering tenfold.”

The book ends without answering the question of what is the right life, and the only clue the reader is left with is the fresh and sunny image of Gerásim, a peasant in Ilych’s household. Gerásim alone sympathized with his master’s pain. Yet, his simple nature was unperturbed by the thought of death, and presumably his close relationship with nature allowed him to view it as a natural cycle.

In Gerásim’s character, one can see Tolstoy’s admiration for the life-affirming powers of the countryside, which is echoed in Anna Karenina and other works.

Tolstoy peeled back the layers of ordinary life to remonstrate against its lack of meaning, but because he was just as human as his characters, he could not show the path to a correct life. He leaves us with the image of Ivan Ilych screaming during his last days in anguish, encapsulating a hidden existential malaise that Tolstoy would struggle with his whole life.

http://thelittlebirdsong.com/

[Jack]

I'm not sure how to review the book as a whole, being a collection of short stories, but I do have some things to say of it. Well, particularly about Tolstoy, which is important to the types of stories that he writes. I think that Tolstoy is rightly recognized worldwide for his profound philosophies and practices. He plays a key role in the development of "Christian anarchism," and strongly believed in nonviolence, most specifically and especially when it came to his beliefs concerning Jesus Christ's teachings. He wrote a book expressing this philosophy in a work titled, "The Kingdom of God is Within You." The book had such a profound impact on Mahatma Gandhi that he sought Tolstoy out so as to be in his presence. Tolstoy's examples were radical enough that he was exiled from his Russia, his home country. Tolstoy was born into a wealthy family but he chose to live as a homeless man and share his money with the poor. The short stories in Great Short Stories each present several things to consider or ponder, and I find that Tolstoy presents his characters to be so real that often times the things I read were deeply disturbing simply for their humanity and the truthfulness behind them. The first short story, "Family Happiness," was perhaps my favorite, and I think everyone should read it even if not the rest of the book. (Goodness, ALL the titles are really boring titles! But entertainment is not the goal of the stories. Though they are not boring, they are intense, but not in a story-like way, if that makes sense.) It is, also, and kind of unfortunately, the most light hearted of the stories. I think that if one enjoys focus on expanding one's mind, that this would really be a good book to read, religious or not. Tolstoy was religious, most of his characters often pray, and there is habitual and culturally realistic reference to "the Lord" and religion throughout the stories, but to those that do not believe in Christ, that has very little to do with the purposes. I liked the book, though I did not always enjoy it. It was easy reading in terms of phrasing, complex reading in terms of concepts (if you take the time to consider them). Tolstoy has a pleasant writing style (though it has been translated from the Russian language, which is also something to consider), and a breathtakingly PROFOUND way of presenting people and their thoughts and feelings. I really do recommend this book, especially to those that pursue wisdom. Not necessarily to just "take from" Tolstoy, but at least to consider one's place in reference to them.

[Gary · Rating 5 out of 5]

To many Tolstoy's name brings to mind the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, masterpieces both, but both quite formidable reads. I expect many readers shy away from these works because they are daunting. But Tolstoy was a prolific writer in genres other than the long novel. His writing evolved over the course of his long career from action-oriented to philosophic. This collection of shorter pieces by Tolstoy spans 45 years. It includes nine short- and long-stories that are a joy to read. Without a doubt Tolstoy is a master of character, plot, and atmosphere. There is a richness, complexity, and depth here that is uncommon in modern fiction. I particularly recommend three stories: The Death of Ivan Ilych, Father Sergius, Madji Murad.

[Nicki Markus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great Short Works of Leo Tolstoy was a pleasant enough collection of novellas and short stories, but it didn't blow me away as much as I thought it would. About half the stories caught and held my attention, but a couple of the others I found rather dull, and overall I didn't think these works had the impact of his longer-form writings. If you are a fan of Tolstoy already, you'll probably find something to enjoy here, but I wouldn't necessarily suggest those new to his works start here unless they really can't face the length of Anna Karenina. This collection gets four stars from me.

[Brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Referring strictly to this particular edition: I speak only a lazy variation of the English language, so when I can tell that a translation is bad something is seriously wrong. I read only "Hadji Murad" and "The Cossacks". The stories themselves were strong enough to shine through, but the wording and syntax was so awkward that I just put the book down and decided to find better translations of the rest.

[Nabilah · Rating 5 out of 5]

He is an amazing writer. His short works are perfect introduction to his minds and to beginners alike. I definitely recommends Leo Tolstoy beginners to read his short works first before moving on to his major novels like Anna Karenina or War And Peace in order to get used to his style of writing.

I enjoyed this purchase very much.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

a wonderful collection of short stories by the Master.

[Zahwil Dossa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Many aspects of life – career, love and marriage, doctors and medicine, social power and status – fall short of their ideals. Our surface-level life might feature a high-status career, a marriage and family, access to top-flight medical care, and a wide circle of friends. Surrounded by these rich relationships we believe we are loved, protected, understood and that our lives are meaningful. Tolstoy reveals a darker truth: people are rarely capable of transcending their own egos to truly understand and love another. In adversity we find ourselves alone.

Some of Tolstoy’s characters try to escape their egos in drastic ways, only to find the ego is not a thing easily shed. For others a crisis or tragedy disrupts their happy existence, making them realize – often too late – the emptiness of the life they led.

Family happiness:
Marya Alexandrovna (“Masha”), a young girl of 17, falls in love with a much older man of 36. The couple settles into married life in the countryside and Masha conceives a child, but boredom soon sets in. Seeking excitement, they travel to St. Petersburg where Masha is praised and fawned over by high society. Masha’s husband is less-than-thrilled, and their marriage is strained. When an even younger and prettier girl arrives on the scene, Masha is cast aside. Beneath the veneer of propriety, warmth and concern, society is revealed as shallow and callous.

The Death of Ivan Illych:
Ivan has a seemingly perfect life: he studies law, marries well, has children, ascends to successively higher positions and income, and acquires in the right order all the trappings of a successful life. Yet when he develops a pain in his side that gets progressively worse, he is prompted to take stock of his life.

Finding himself truly alone in confronting death, he discovers with horror that his whole life has been lived wrong.

Neither his colleagues and bridge-playing friends, nor the celebrated doctors called upon to treat him, nor even his wife and daughter, are capable of any true feeling or compassion. They are preoccupied with their own affairs, exactly as Ivan had formerly been with his own.

Ivan is everywhere meeting people who inquire after his health saying the proper things but only barely concealing their indifference. They are not him; his pain and suffering are not theirs, and his growing awareness that he will soon die does not prompt them to give a second thought to their own mortality.

“The syllogism… ‘Caius is a man, men are mortal, therefore Caius is mortal’ has always seemed to him correct as applied to Caius, but certainly not as applied to himself”.

Ivan is consoled only by his simple servant Gerasim, who alone is selfless and sincere in his feelings of compassion.

This story was my favorite from the collection. Keeping our death in mind, skipping ahead to the end, is a valuable lens to evaluate the worth of our lives.

The Cossacks:
In this story Tolstoy shows us his ideal of a good life but also the futility of realizing it.
Dimitri Olenin, born into privilege and wealth, abandons the easy life that awaits him, instead accepting a posting in the remote and mountainous Caucasus. He falls in love with the landscape, with the simple and natural way the Cossacks live, and with a girl called Maryanka.

“It came quite naturally to him to wake up at daybreak. After drinking tea and admiring from his porch the mountains, the morning, and Maryanka, he would put on a tattered ox-hide coat, sandals of soaked raw hide, buckle on a dagger, take a gun, put cigarettes and some lunch in a little bag, call his dog, and soon after five o’clock would start for the forest beyond the village”.

“The people live as nature lives: they die, are born, unite, and more are born – they fight, eat and drink, rejoice and die, without any restrictions but those that nature imposes on sun and grass, on animal and tree. They have no other laws”.

While captivated by the Cossack way of life, Olenin realizes that happiness lies in a life of love and self-sacrifice.

Olenin tries to live as such and gives an expensive horse to a Cossack as an act of altruism, but his gift is met with suspicion instead of gratitude. Alas, life among the Cossacks is not as easy as he imagined. Olenin is caught between two worlds: the one he left behind no longer fits him, while the Cossack world remains enigmatic and not fully habitable.

Despite his longing to leave behind his former world, Olenin is too self-aware and burdened with consciousness to bridge the unbridgeable divide between himself and Cossack people.

The Devil
This story is about a man, Eugene Ivanich, who settles down to married life with his wife Liza. Eugene, however, is horrified that his dark past will upend the life he hopes to have. Before marrying Liza, Eugene carried on an affair with Stepandidia, a peasant in the village whose husband worked in a nearby town. Eugene is terrified Liza will discover his past and, more alarming still, that his ongoing desire for Stepandida cannot be contained.

The story continues with the theme that one cannot escape from oneself. Our past shapes us and follows us around.

The Kreutzer Sonata
In this story a man consumed by jealously and hatred of his wife, whom he believes has been unfaithful, decides to murder her.

Over the course of a long train ride, the man argues that love and marriage are a sham; they create the illusion of a spiritual bond when in fact there is only short-lived sexual desire.

“…in theory love is something ideal and exalted, but in practice it is something abominable, swinish, which is horrid and shameful to mention or remember”.

“A woman…. knows very well that all the talk about elevated subjects is just talk, but that what a man wants is her body and all that presents it in the most deceptive but alluring light; and she acts accordingly”.

While the man’s views about love and marriage are reductionist, the points he makes are eerily familiar to anyone who has had a longish relationship. The initial infatuation with a new lover inevitably passes and irritations and annoyances creep in. Children, when they arrive, need constant attention and plague us with worry, adding further strain to the relationship.

Yet a spiritual bond often does form, and persist, within and throughout a marriage. I’m unsure whether Tolstoy experienced the bad edge of a relationship or merely imagines what it must be like. Either which way, the story will make you reflect on the meaning of love and marriage.

Master and Man
A merchant, Vasili Andreevich, and his servant Nikita are caught unawares in a snowstorm. As nothing can been seen ahead, they are forced to stop their horse and wait out the storm. But they cannot survive long and will soon die of exposure.

This story reminds me of “the Death of Ivan Ilych”. For Vasili, as for Ivan, the prospect of imminent death causes him to take the retrospective and alter his judgment of what is important or worthwhile.

“And he remembered his money, his shop, his house, the buying and selling, and Mironov’s millions, and it was hard for him to understand why that man, called Vasili Brekhunov, had troubled himself with all those things with which he had been troubled”.

The servant Nikita is like the Gerasim character in Ivan Ilych: a simple, loyal peasant who is at peace and unburdened by pretense or fear.

“Nikita had not stirred. Like all those who live in touch with nature and have known want, he was patient and could wait for hours, even days, without growing restless or irritable”.

“The thought that he might, and very probably would, die that night occurred to him, but did not seem particularly unpleasant or dreadful.”

In the end Vasili lays on top of Nikita in the snow, a final act of selfless love that saves his servant’s life.

“He remembered that Nikita was lying under him and that he had got warm and was alive, and it seemed to him that he was Nikita and Nikita was he, and that his life was not in himself but in Nikita”.

Vasili therefore does transcend his ego and experience spiritual harmony, but ominously only in death.

Father Sergius
This story is a parable on the nature of ambition and pride and is my second favorite in the collection.

As a boy success comes easily to Stepan Kasatsky. He directs his immense talents and ambition toward accumulating accomplishments and ascending the ranks of the Russian military service.

“Apart from his main vocation, which was the services of his Tsar and the fatherland, he always set himself some particular aim, and however unimportant it was, devoted himself completely to it and lived for it until it was accomplished. And as soon as it was attained another aim would immediately present itself, replacing its predecessor. This passion for distinguishing himself, or for accomplishing something in order to distinguish himself, filled his life”.

When Katatsky discovers his fiancé had been a lover of the Tsar, his worldview is shattered. He decides to reject all things that other people care about and that had formerly concerned him. Renouncing all worldly desires, he becomes a monk.

He adjusts easily to an ascetic life, to the discipline, prayer and solitude that characterize monk-hood. His only source of suffering is his strong desire for the female body.

“Why does the whole world, with all its delights, exist if it is sinful and must be renounced? Why hast thou created this temptation?”

When a young woman travels to his solitary cell with the intent of seducing him, he is so overcome by desire that he chops off his own finger with an axe in order to resist her. He tells her:

“Dear sister, why did you wish to ruin your immortal soul? Temptations must come into the world, but woe to him by who temptation comes. Pray that God may forgive us!”

The incident inspires the woman to renounce her former life and become a nun. Rumours soon abound that Kasatsky has the power to cure people of any disease or ailment, and swarms of people seek him out.

A change comes over Kasatsky. He starts to believe that he really can perform miracles, and his life once again becomes centered around accomplishment; this time the healing of all the people who ask to be cured.

At this point Kasatsky breaks down and realizes he has failed himself and allowed his ego to reign once again.

“In how far is what I do for God and in how far is it for men? That was the question that insistently tormented him and to which he was not so much unable to give himself an answer as unable to face the answer”.

In his final fall, Kasatsky yields to his lust and sleeps with a young woman who sought his healing powers.

After this Kasatsky can longer maintain the charade of his life. Guided by a dream in which he recalls a childhood friend, Pashenka, he clothes himself as a beggar and seeks her out.

Pashenka is herself almost destitute, but nonetheless welcomes the unrecognizable Kasatsky with love and charity. Overcome, Kasatksy opens his heart to her:

“Pashenka, please listen to what I am going to tell you as to a confession made to God at my last hour. Pashenka, I am not a holy man, I am not even as good as a simple man; I am a loathsome, vile, and proud sinner who has gone astray, and who, if not worse than everyone else, is at least worse than most very bad people.

Perhaps you exaggerate, Stiva?

No, Pashenka. I am an adulterer, a murderer, a blasphemer, and a deceiver”.

Kasatsky thinks:
“So that is what my dream meant! Pashenka is what I ought to have been but failed to be. I lived for men on the pretext of living for God, while she lives for God imagining that she lives for men.”

Throughout his life Kasatsky sought respite from his ego. He sought to squash his pride and hoped that the life of a monk would provide such an escape.

Like the Tolstoy characters in the other stories, Kasatsky is dismayed to discover that the demons that plagued him in his early life were always inside him and would not die.

Alyosha the Pot
This is a very short tale about a Christlike character, Alyosha, who devotes himself entirely to others, never giving a second thought to himself or his needs. Everyone around him treats him as a slave except for a servant girl, Ustinja, with whom he falls in love. Sadly, the family he serves forbid the union, and he accepts this decree with the same cheerful attitude.

Alyosha finally dies while at work. Even on his deathbed he never strays from his calm and selfless way of being.

Alyosha has no ego at all and is therefore opposite of the characters in the other stories whose egos bring about their suffering and demise.

NOTE: I did not review Hadji Murad which I’ve noticed is the favorite story of many reviewers of this collection. I enjoyed this story but decided to leave it out of my review as it is so different from the others in its theme.

[O'Neal Sadler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Between work and writing, I haven't had as much time to read as I would like, but I knew I had to wrestle with a little Tolstoy. His stories collected are some of his best known (Death of Ivan Ilych, Kreutzer Sonata, Master and Man, etc.) as well as his least read (Hadji Murat, according to Harold Bloom, is one of Tolstoy's best stories--I agree; it was insightful but not my personal favorite).

What typifies Tolstoy is his moral courage. How does one live a life of full integrity in the face of death and moral degradation? Being Christian, he would say God. But that is just the starting point. Faith is more than just a belief. It's a way of life. It is wrestling with the demons of desire, lust, rage and hate, as well as domesticity--bad marriages and middle-class/bourgeois comforts are treated as a disease slowly but surely eating away at your soul like a cancer of the stomach (that would be Ivan Ilych, my personal favorite).

But I ponder. What if you're not so sure of God's existence? What if the love of God is just not enough to reassure a restless spirit? The answer can only come through contemplation (here, I am mentioning his other great text, Confessions). Yes, a belief is necessary, but it's less important that you believe in God than that you at the least understand your mortality needn't be without meaning or moral purpose. A fulfilled life is one that centers others in your considerations. Of contemplation and thought. Acquiring lots and lots of stuff is just feeding your ego, but leaving your soul starving. Is this really how one should live? Count Leo says no way!

I could go on, but I would say what is most satisfying about these stories is that they are simple and elegant, even if some are better than others. Master and Man is my second favorite, but I will be the first to admit it may not be to everyone's tastes.

So do your soul a favor, and read this book. It is an excellent intro into his larger oeuvre.

[Bibliomantic · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whenever there is talk of a great Russian writer whose specialty was psychological insight into man, the name of Dostoevsky tends to pop up. But I think that Tolstoy is far more deserving. As much as Dostoevsky can drawl on about minutiae to the point of excrescence, Tolstoy will lay bare the mind in turmoil in economical, but abundantly insightful language. Whether it is the vicissitudes of a developing relationship and marriage, or of one that’s coming apart and heading for disaster, the frustrations of lust or anger, or the diseased form of leadership nurtured by sycophancy, Tolstoy’s insight and ability to lay it bare is unsurpassed. That he can do it all and make the reader altogether forget that he is reading, and that he is not actually present at the scenes, is equally stunning. A remarkable collection. Tolstoy is famous for his huge tomes, but I think he especially excelled in the shorter format.

[Meaad · Rating 4 out of 5]

This isn’t the kind of book you read for leisure its the kind you read to face yourself, quietly. Tolstoy doesn’t just tell stories he reveals the human soul in its rawest moments when faced with death, with pride, with silence, or with rare, unshakable honesty.

Each story carries something like wisdom, wrapped in a gentle kind of pain. In The Death of Ivan Ilyich, I didn’t just read about death I felt it inch closer, as if Tolstoy were whispering: “Life isn’t what you think it is. Its what slips through when you’re not paying attention.”
And in How Much Land Does a Man Need?
the ending wasn’t shocking it was true. Quietly devastating. A question meant for all of us.

These stories are brief, but they carry the weight of a life fully observed. They show you how loss can be silent, how purity exists even when no one sees it, and how a single honest intention can shift an entire fate.

This is a book to read slowly like a prayer you don’t want to rush.

[Edwin Martin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I already had read The Cossacks, Family Happiness and The Death of Ivan Ilych in a previous collection. Hadji Murad was the most disappointing, reflecting I suppose, Tolstoy's conclusion at that stage of his life, the futility of men gaining anything noble in war. Kreutzer Sonata is "a story told in first person on a train ride" of the (IMO) deranged husband justifying the murder of his wife for her assumed infidelity. Master & Man and the short short of Alyosia the Pot are both stories of living a life of noble purpose, the first of the master realizing it only in the last two days of life and Alyosia living that way from the very beginning of his short humble life. Conflict in our own soul is the theme of Father Sergius and The Devil about what we should do and why; and what about when we fail?

[Vikas Kuswaha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Russia has produced some of the greatest people in the area of literature. The work of Russian authors varies from romance, satire, religion, politics. Various genres are popular among readers, starting from poetry, novels, and short fiction stories to literary realism and symbolism. Their work has been published and translated worldwide and attracted many readers.
Leo Tolstoy is a great story teller. His stories induce moral values into children and adults alike. This Maple 🍁 Press Classic Edition contains 36 short stories and Novellas. Some of my favorites😍💕 are:
A Prisoner in the Caucasus
The Forged Coupon
A Spark neglected burns the House
What men live by
God sees the truth, but waits
Two old man
My dream
Alyosha the pot
Little girls wiser than men
The Godson
Where love is, God is
How much land does a man need?
The story of Ivan the Fool.