War and Peace
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Anyone else hated this book?
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Mustafa
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rated it 5 stars
Jul 11, 2012 09:57PM
To me, this was the worst book ever. I have read so many other huge fat classic novels such as Les Miserables, Don Quixote, Vanity Fair, Middlemarch, etc. But to me, this was nothing more than an overdramatic unromantic romance soap opera with little to do with the actual Napoleon wars and was also a very biased view of this era. Anyone else? I felt the same way about Anna Karenina.
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I went for two stars, and I like Anna Karenina. But yes, honestly, I hate this book. I read it in my teens, took a strong dislike then, but didn't in the least trust my judgement. Read it again last year - in my forties now, expected a different outcome, but in a way was comforted when I felt just the same. In my eyes (lowers her voice) it's a bad novel. The second time, I came partly for a portrait of Napoleon... and I found a spoof, too absurd to have existed (are we in a comic strip or a great novel?)
-Isn't that I don't like big fat olds, either; I'm a fan of these others you list. I'm into Russian 19thC particularly.
Yes I hated it.
it seemed to go on and on and on and onI have no idea how I actually managed to finish reading it. There was a bit in the middle that really dragged.
the difficultly I find with classic books is the writing style and the speed can make them feel quite slow and I have to admit I didn't care much about some of the characters.
If I read it again now, I don't think I would bother to finish reading it, it's not worth the slog
Lynden wrote: "It has been many years, and many books ago that I read War and Peace. At the time, a new BBC version was going to come out and I was determined to watch it and read the book as well. I got the Clif..."I read at least 3 translations. It was just the story was so boring. I love Russian literature. You know, Dostoyevsky, Pushkin, Gogol, Nabokov, etc. But, Tolstoy? Forget him.
I have NEVER been able to get past the first 10 pages. It is so boring.
I thought this book was quite good. Yes, it had its boring parts but I thought what made up for it was Tolstoy as the historian.I enjoyed his perspective on Napoleon, that he wasn't quite the military genius historians have made him out to be.
@Mustafa"To me, this was the worst book ever. I have read so many other huge fat classic novels such as Les Miserables, Don Quixote, Vanity Fair, Middlemarch, etc. But to me, this was nothing more than an overdramatic unromantic romance soap opera ..."
"I read at least 3 translations"
If this, for you, was so 'boring' that it was 'the worst book ever' why on earth did you not only re-read it a second time but then a third time?
I rather think you protest too much ...
@MustafaAnd for that matter, what do you mean 'at least three'? Are you suggesting you may have read the book four or even five times? How many times do you read books you actually like?
I really can't imagine.
I read this book for a course in college many, many years ago, and I strongly disliked it. I decided to give it a second chance a couple years back, and I was surprised to find myself really enjoying it. I'm sure the years that passed gave me some perspective, but I'm also sure that reading it by CHOICE instead of being required to read it made a big difference.
This is not something I would tackle again, although I did love Anna Karenina and would consider reading it again. I liked War and Peace until about the last 100 pages where he just seems to ramble on and on. I wasn't sure if I just was ready to get on to something else or if it was the content that was frustrating me, but I would bet on the content. I am a much bigger fan of Dostoevsky's style, content, and sense of humor.
I read it in the summer of ´67 as part of my high school English requirement. We had to choose two books and write a book report when we got back to school or read from a very short list of longer classics and only read one book. I had heard of W & P and was curious as to what it was about. I did not regret it. Although it was not my favorite, it could have used considerable editing. What I do recall mostly about my reading of it, after 45 years, was 1) that one of the characters had written a proposal for the reorganization of the Russian Army but because he was not as well politically connected as another, never was successful in having his country adopt his ideas.
2) The heroine or main female character was even in her early adult years particularly able in administering a large household.
3) the fat character was in love with character #2 and finally married her after her true love died in the war and he lost a lot of weight in a campaign march in which others, thinner than him, died of hunger.
So can anyone tell me how many I got right?
Nik wrote: "@MustafaAnd for that matter, what do you mean 'at least three'? Are you suggesting you may have read the book four or even five times? How many times do you read books you actually like?
I reall..."
Let me clear it up for you. I thought that maybe I wasn't enjoying it because the translation may have been crappy. Okay?
And forget "at least" 3. I READ THREE TRANSLATIONS, OKAY? The Constance Garnett, the Maude, and the Pevear-Volokhonsky.
I still don't really get why you felt obliged to keep re-reading something you evidently hated so much ...... unless of course the obligation came from your college course professor or some such.
But then if that was the case, I would suggest that you might not have realised that you don't actually have to like - let alone enjoy - a novel in order to write a college paper about it.
In fact, I would argue that actually enjoying a novel you have to write a paper on puts you at a distinct disadvantage.
But anyway, in answer to your question 'Anyone else hate this book?', my answer (for what it may be worth) is 'no'.
I think Tolstoy himself said this was not a novel. I felt it was many genres mixed together. It was a family saga and a historical novel and a cultural analysis and a philosophy. I enjoyed it but I think this book would be well served being edited. :)
"После обеда Наташа, по просьбе князя Андрея, пошла к клавикордам и стала петь. Князь Андрей стоял у окна, разговаривая с дамами, и слушал ее. В середине фразы князь Андрей замолчал и почувствовал неожиданно, что к его горлу подступают слезы, возможность которых он не знал за собой. Он посмотрел на поющую Наташу, и в душе его произошло что-то новое и счастливое. Он был счастлив, и ему вместе с тем было грустно. Ему решительно не о чем было плакать, но он готов был плакать? О чем? О прежней любви? О маленькой княгине? О своих разочарованиях?.. О своих надеждах на будущее? Да и нет. Главное, о чем ему хотелось плакать, была вдруг живо сознанная им страшная противоположность между чем-то бесконечно великим и неопределимым, бывшим в нем, и чем-то узким и телесным, чем был он сам и даже была она. Эта противоположность томила и радовала его во время ее пения."
This has been one of my favourite bits for the longest time ... Prince Andrei asks Natasha to entertain the company with her singing. And it's while he's conversing with the ladies at the window that Natasha's singing almost overpowers him.The volume of Natasha's voice rises until it fills the volume of the room so that her voice is in every corner, so that she seems to be everywhere at once, yet all the evidence before Prince Andrei points to the contrary - that she's this petite young girl, no doubt dwarfed by the grand piano, standing at the far side of the room.
The scene strikes a chord with Prince Andrei, and analogous this slender fragile body of this girl that nonetheless produces this robust clear voice, he suddenly becomes aware of the almost pitiful narrowness of the space his own flesh and blood occupies; in other words his insignificance in the midst of the infinite that surrounds him.
And he is almost overwhelmed by it, tears dam up his throat and he's unable to speak. But he is clearly liberated by this experience and it fills him with joy even at the same time as he is about to be capsized by it.
... hmmm ...
I know most of you guys hate this book but, really, was there ever such a scene as this on 'Days of Our Lives'? Did Dr Drake Ramorez (; - )) ever express any such kind of feeling? I don't remember anything half so affecting on Desperate Housewives or Housewives of OC County.
Still, if you hate it you hate it ... I'm not trying to make you change your opinion. Honest.
Lynden wrote: "Nik wrote: "This has been one of my favourite bits for the longest time ... Prince Andrei asks Natasha to entertain the company with her singing. And it's while he's conversing with the ladies at t..."I think that's a really good point, and it may not even be an intellectual or spiritual maturity, it might just be a kind of inner motivation.
I was never able to get past about page 3 or 4 of any Dickens novels I read until I was in my late 20s and then, for some reason, I found I could not only read it really easily but also really enjoy it.
I certainly did not hate it, but it took me a long time to read (several years). I interrupted my reading several times. But now I am thinking to re-read it in one go. In fact it is a very good and consequent story, only the 'history lessons' make it a bit dull.
I've found that those I loved before 20, I love forever. Includes The Brothers Karamazov - my no.1 then and now - and Seven Pillars of Wisdom, mentioned above. I don't seem to change my mind... Not that I don't understand them better with age. On the other hand it's like those I came to early got deeper into me - when my brain was putty, no doubt.
I loved War and Peace, but i did think another biggie (Les Miserables) is better.
Really? I also really enjoyed Les Miserables so that doesn't surprise me, but it seems a very different book (more like Dickens) than W&P
I really think this is one of the best books ever written! Tolstoi not only uses a wonderful language, but is also able to describe the daily life of the russian society within the historical context of the war against napoleon. Like most of the russian major novels, it isn't about writing an exciting, rousing fiction story, but to interlace ideas, trends and philosophical idealisms of the time, in other words, to create a picture of the zeitgeist for future generations.
Everyone hating this book because the story isn't "exciting" enough should try thinking along, otherwise you should maybe keep at reading Harry Potter...
Everyone hating this book because the story isn't "exciting" enough should try thinking along, otherwise you should maybe keep at reading Harry Potter...
I enjoyed the "peace" sections, but grew bored with the endless "war" parts.
I am not surprised that a lot of people don't like it as it is long and does ramble a bit and has so many characters that the first time I read it I had to stick a copy of the character list next to me just so I could keep up It is however my fav book of all time and I have read it so many times I love it more with each reading , I like the idea that it is split into 2 half of it war and battles and historical campaigns and the other half family and love
I totally fell in love with prince Andrei the first time I read it ...
Which reminds me I must be due for another re read again soon
To me, War and Peace has the same problem as Moby Dick and Les Miserables. All three of them are gripping stories burdened by lengthy, extraneous digressions. In War and Peace, it's the endless descriptions of battle strategy, of interest only to war historians. In Moby Dick, it's Melville's tedious descriptions of the difference between foremasts and regular masts, and other shipboard details. In Les Miserable, it's Hugo's tiresome description of the Paris sewers.
Aloha wrote: "I really think this is one of the best books ever written! Tolstoi not only uses a wonderful language, but is also able to describe the daily life of the russian society within the historical conte..."I enjoyed Hugo and Proust more for their writing, even though the plot was also great. Tolstoy has great plots, but for some reason his writing is just not suited for me. I prefer Dostoyevsky.
I can't agree more. It took me nearly 5 attempts until I was able to read it all the way through. For this type of writing the reader has to reach a certain level of maturity and have some life experiences in order to connect with the message. Suddenly when the magic happens, you are able to absorb all the deepness of Tolstoy's thoughts and you are enjoying every single sentence of this big book.
I liked the Peace chapters, but the War chapters were stupefyingly dull.
Topic starter - answer is @No@.Love this book, as much as all Tolstoy - man is a very observant genius.
Nik, agree with you.)
My favourite book ever!!! I've read it three times over the years, and think of it as one of my friends.It is the book I would choose to have on a desert island.
Michael wrote: "My favourite book ever!!! I've read it three times over the years, and think of it as one of my friends.It is the book I would choose to have on a desert island."
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I've just been through some of the comments on W/P and frankly I'm suprised at how people can be so determinedly negative about it.It seems that instead of reading the book independently with an unbiased view they've taken to heart the old cliche of W/P being the epitome of a long boring book and this has coloured their reading. I think W/P is a wonderful book and there is somthingin it for everyone, do yourself a favour and try again.
I also waded through the whole book. I do not understand why it is called one of the greatest novels of all times. I thought it was boring; however, I did like Anna Karenina.
What is it with this feeling of 'having to' wade through books you don't like? There are so many classics in English and in translation from more than 300+ years of novels and 1000's of years of poems and epics that - jeez - if you really hate one that much dump it and go get another one ... it's not as if you'll ever be able to get through them all ...
Re-read the first page so many times trying to get into the book, that I had the entire first paragraph committed to memory.
I first read (and finished!) "War and Peace" about a year ago. Since then I have read several other novels (including other classics) but lately the urge to reread "War and Peace" just became too strong.I have just started reading again, and finished the 3 first chapters.
How anyone can possibly read these chapters and NOT understand that these have been written by a genius, is beyond me. If you honestly feel that "the beginning is so boring" or "I could never get past the first 10 pages" etc, I feel that you have no understanding of how a novel should work. If this offends you, I am sorry, but it is my honest opinion.
Tolstoy describes several of the main characters in more depth in just the first 10 pages, than most authors can do in an entire book. How can you fail to notice this? As others have written here: man is a very observant genius. And the diversity in this novel!
I read War and Peace around the time my daughter was born, so maybe it was a reflection of my life at the time, with a newborn and a 3 year old--but I did enjoy it despite, or maybe because of, its length and detail. I have a permanent picture in my mind from it--of a beautiful spring day, birds, flowers, and all--on a meadow that was shortly to become a battlefield. To me it brought the message of the futility of war, which is something I still firmly believe in, 32 years later. And--someone commented about the tedious detail in Moby Dick about ships, sails, etc--I found that absolutely fascinating, not being a sea-going person!
It took me at least 6 months to get through this monster. It started off well and I don't remember the version I had but I thought the introduction was excellent, which really helps. But the middle section really, really dragged and so yes I did find this pretty boring. I actually read this when I was 22 because at the time I had this inexplicable, possibly masochistic desire to read really long books. Read a lot of Michener around this time, the difference being that Michener's books are way more fascinating and better written.However, I do think that the one redeeming factor of this book is how it dispells the myth of Napoleon as a 'great general'. After reading this book, that is the last adjective that comes to mind to desribe him so I bet this book deflated the Pro-Napoleonic French people at the time and even today (if they still exist).
Finally, the mistake of an empire or army stretching itself too far to the point where it breaks up and gets out of control is a very valid warning to the US in the modern world methinks. Chalmers Johnson thinks that that may be the single greatest threat that the US faces - a self-inflicted one.
I am from Russia and we read such boks in age of 15 -16 .
Little to do with the Napoleonic Wars...? You're kidding, right? I'm not trying to be a jerk, but you finished the novel...?
Austerlitz...Borodino... the burning of Moscow. The author spent several hundred pages describing these battles and their implications, as well as military strategy. The book adequately described the sentiment of the French soldiers as they seem to "win" battles but lost the conflict against the Russians.
Biased? Are you kidding me? THAT'S THE POINT! Tolstoy ranted for several pages about how history will forever portray Napoleon as an almost godlike warrior who conquered entire countries swiftly and easily, but his role in the actual battles was nil. The book explored the role that commanders actually played on the battlefield... there is a ton of detail regarding the battles...
I could go on for several paragraphs about this. What's the point? I just don't think you read it at all.
There are several great posts on here about the various military strategies.
I'll never forget the scene where the soldiers who were waiting in the valley for their orders... they kept getting shelled... they watched their comrades die and they stood there waiting and waiting. Unforgettable.
This book is a masterpiece. The most recent translation is very good.
I hated it, the first time I read it. I was, I think, 13, and really wanted to impress myself with having read such a massively respected (and quite heavy) book. I couldn't finish it - I honestly think I didn't get through the first book. Far too many parties and soirees and balls for a reader who actually preferred muscular stories about orcs and swords and whatnot.Much, much later I took the same book along with me into the woods of British Columbia. Camping in a trailer in the middle of nowhere, without any TV or distractions, I was damned determined I would finish it, whether it was good or not. I slugged my way through it, and found out how amazing a novel it was.
There is to War and Peace something that made me, after so many (many!) pages about its characters, that world, want it to go on, and to go on. Even now, when I think of it, I didn't want that book to end, that world to come to a close. And to me that was the power of a truly great book - to create or relate a world so complete and full that a reader could lose himself in it, and let it fill him completely.
Oh, this site is fun. What's amazing to me is that so few of those who comment have stretched, reached, worked to take in a work of literature. I can't dance Balanchine, so Balanchine sucks. I can't play Rachmaninoff, Rachmaninoff had a tremendous finger-span which makes him inaccessible to some smaller-handed people who may be women, so Rachmaninoff is offensive to me. I've read the same sort of dismissive comments about Chatterly, Bovary, all the building blocks, all the steps, that brought us where we are. But there are thoughtful comments here, too, made by those who know that literature is a path through a dark woods and that each of us carries a dim lantern that only sheds so much gentle light, we can only see so deeply into the forest and the rest is mystery. Forgive me. Don't trust anything over 30.
I skipped the parts about war. ;)
Ellen wrote: "...literature is a path through a dark woods and that each of us carries a dim lantern that only sheds so much gentle light, we can only see so deeply into the forest and the rest is mystery. Forgive me. Don't trust anything over 30." such a fabulous comment on this, and many other works besides. Thank you.
I thought the book was epic and that's the only reason I was able to finish the thing. I'm amazed people had the drive to finish it if they didn't like it as it is a monster of a book.
Mustafa wrote: "To me, this was the worst book ever...etc."This is the worst thread ever. Even if you "hate" War and Peace, you should at least try to make an intelligible case for how it failed you as a work of fiction. And how other "classics" you've read succeeded (in your estimation). And if you can do that without exposing yourself as an utter idiot, you'll have made a contribution to understanding. Needless to say - and of course this is simply a often repeated, even inherited, point of view - in the judgment of many readers - and not simply readers who, like the professional professoriate, are paid to appreciate "works of literature," but in the judgment of everyday readers like me and you and the rest of the people who have offered their views in this worst of all possible threads - in the judgment of millions of everyday readers, War and Peace is the "Greatest Novel of All Time." When one cavalierly asserts, "I hate it," those who feel themselves part of the critical consensus that views both Tolstoy and War and Peace as "great" have two immediate responses: "Why?" and "Surely, this is a moron." Whatever you say after "I hate it" should at least respond to that question and observation, as a matter of public service at least as great as your serving of "I hate what you love."
I LOVED it. I've read it twice, and I hope to reread it at least a couple of more times before I die.
Paul wrote: "Mustafa wrote: "To me, this was the worst book ever...etc."This is the worst thread ever. Even if you "hate" War and Peace, you should at least try to make an intelligible case for how it failed ..."
I am not sure exactly how this thread works yet, but I agree with Paul's comments 100%.
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