Hadji Murat by Leo Tolstoy

Hadji Murat by Leo Tolstoy (1912, 212 pages, with introduction)

Leo Tolstoy's Last Work

Hadji Murat was Leo Tolstoy's (1828 to 1910-Russian) last work.   It was published posthumously.   Since I began my blog in July 2009, I have posted on two of his shorter works of fiction, "How Much Land Does a Man Need" and "Ivan the Fool".   (There is some background information on Tolstoy in my prior posts on him.)

I think it is hard to read the secondary fiction of Tolstoy without having in your mind his big books, War and Peace and Anna Karenina.   To those new to Tolstoy, I would say go for it and first read War and Peace and then Anna Karenina.   (I just saw a commercial for the Greta Garbo Anna Karenina movie.  It is a great movie but try to read the book before you see it as Garbo is so great as Anna you will not be able to see Anna any other way.)

As the translators of this work (Kyril Zinovieff and Jenny Hughes) say in their very well done introduction the basic story line sounds like something we might hear on CNN.   Political leaders in the Georgia area rebel against Russian overlords.    The plot is about the life and leadership of one of the Caucasian  leaders, Hadji Murat.

I found the plot really interesting and there are lot of great details that bring the story to life for us.   Murat is forced to side with the Russians when they take his family hostage.   I will leave the plot unspoiled but there is a good retelling of it here for those needing homework help .  

I was sent a complementary copy of this very well produced book by the publisher, One World Classics.   I extend to them by thanks for this.   

I think this book would be good background reading for anyone interested in the history of the region.  


The introduction does a good job of explaining the political history of the region.   There is also about a twenty page article on the life and work of Tolstoy at the end of the book.  The publisher and translators have done a good job with the extra materials.   


Mel u

How The Two Ivans Quarrelled by Nikolai Gogol

How The Two Ivans Quarrelled by Nikolai Gogol (1834, 75 pages)

A Marvelous Comic Story by the

author of Dead Souls

Prior Gogol Post

Russian Literature 

How The Two Ivans Quarrelled is the lead story in a wonderfully done collection of short 19th Century Russian comic stories How The Two Ivans Quarrelled and Other Russian Comic Tales (translated by and with introductory notes by Guy Daniels) published by One World Classics.


I have previously posted on stories by two new to me writers whose stories I really like, Ivan Krylov and Mikhail Saltykov, included in this book.    I hope to read more of their stories.    Krylov's collection of fables and short stories sold more copies than any book in 19th century Russia besides The Bible.   Saltykov wrote very funny and biting satires on Russian society, he was one funny high level Czarist tax collection officer!   I also read and posted on Tolstoy's Ivan the Fool.


In his very interesting and educational essay Guy Daniels says Gogol (1809 to 1852-there is some back ground information in my prior three posts on Gogol) is was one of the inventors of the comic short story and that Why The Two Ivans Quarrelled is "perhaps the best, and certainly the first, masterpiece of its kind".  


I really liked How The Two Ivans Quarrelled.   The two Ivans start the story as best of old friends.   They own adjoining estates in rural Russia.  Both are small land holders and own a few serfs but they still do work on their estates themselves.   


I really liked how Gogol made use of small details to bring the characters to life.    One of the Ivans is single and in a semi scandal he has a woman that comes and visits him periodically and stays a long time.   I thought OK he has his younger beautiful girl friend but no she is a woman his age shaped like a barrel that keeps him totally in line.   


One day the two Ivans are visiting and one of them offers to buy the other's shotgun.   The fall out terribly in negotiations over the price of the shotgun.   The falling out is so bad that one of the Ivans, in an hilarious scene, sneaks over on the others properties and destroys one the buildings.   The two men end up filing formal complaints on each other with the magistrate.   One Ivan even brings a complaint on a pig owned by the other.   It turns out the complaint is for a capital crime and if found guilty the pig can be sentenced to death.   At first the owner says his pig is innocent and he will never allow him to be  killed.   The judge in a move worthy of Solomon says "why don't you just solve the problem by turning the pig into hams and could you give me a few of those wonderful sausages your lady friend is famous for making?"


The more serious of  the complaints of the Ivans drags on in the courts for years.   In the mean time the Ivans get older and all of the pleasure seems to go our of their lives.   What they really enjoyed doing was just hanging out with each other and enjoining the  pleasures of life as a small landowner  in rural Russia.    Both men have lost the most important, maybe the only important, relationship in their lives but both are too stubborn to make the first move even though everyone urges them to make up.


I really enjoyed read this story.   Recently I saw the classic movie by Roman Polanski (with Sharon Tate)  The Fearless Vampire Killers.   The atmosphere of that movie seems very like that of the story.  


I commend totally One World Classics for publishing How the Two Ivans Quarrelled and Other Comic Tales.   It is well produced on quality paper with a crisp easily readable font.   


In the interest of full disclosure, I was given a copy of this and other books by the publisher


The next Gogol I read will be his drama The Inspector General (on which the Danny Kaye movie of that name was based on).






Mel u

"Ivan the Fool" by Leo Tolstoy

"Ivan the Fool" by Leo Tolstoy  (1886, 35 pages)

A Comic Parable 

My Posts on Russian Literature

"Ivan the Fool" by Leo Tolstoy is the final story in One World Classics Why the Two Ivans Quarrelled by Nikolai Gogol and other Comics Russian Stories.  So far I have posted on stories by Ivan Krylov and Mikhal Saltykov.   I enjoyed both of these writers and reading them helped expand my understanding of 19th century Russian literature.   (I will soon post on the lead story in the collection.)

Leo Tolstoy (1828 to 1910-Russia) in addition to War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1877)  wrote a number of parable and fairy tale like short stories expressing his religious faith and his social beliefs.     The two most famous of these stories are "Ivan the Fool" and "How Much Land Does a Man Need" (my review of this story can be found here).

"Ivan the Fool" expresses Tolstoy's disdain for the Russian social system and his belief in the intrinsic goodness of the Russian peasant and the sanctity of manual labor.    It is also an expression of his understanding of the duties of a Christian toward others.   It is also a use of the "holy fool" tradition that was a strong part of  Russian culture.

The plot is simple.   An old devil sees three brothers who get along well and have divided up the estate of their father without quarrelling.     One brother is a soldier, one a business man, and the third is a simple man that works the fields with his own hands.   They have a deaf mute sister but she does not play a large part in the story.    (Maybe her being a deaf mute is somehow a symbolic representation of the weak state of women in Russian society but I will let that question go.)

The old devil decided to see if he can ruin the lives of the three brothers.  He sends three imps after each of the brothers.   Two of the brothers are easy prey because of their greed and vanity.   Ivan the fool with his simplicity, honesty, and directness gets the better of his imp.   The great fun of this story is seeing how the imps do get the better of two of the brothers but defeat by Ivan.   I will leave the rest of  the plot untold.

"Ivan the Fool" is pushing a social agenda and Tolstoy had by now come to not belief in art for its own sake.   In essence it is telling us that all of the real work of Russia is done by her peasants who carry on their backs a giant superstructure of parasites.

I think even if Tolstoy wrote only his parables and short stories he would still have readers.   In talking about the merits and the worth reading index of works like "Ivan the Fool" and "How Much Land Does a Man Need" one has to fight the impulse just to say "Hey look the world's greatest novelist wrote these stories so go read them already".

I really liked "Ivan the Fool".   It would not be a bad introduction to Tolstoy for those who have not read him yet.

Guy Daniels translated this story.   It is very well written and a very enjoyable read.

In the interest of full disclosure, I was sent  by the publisher a free copy of this and other books.     I have begun to read his Hadji Murat and hopefully will post on that soon.

What is your experience with the lesser known works of Tolstoy?

Mel u

Mikhail Saltykov- 19th century Russian Comic Writer

"A Tale of How One Muzhik Looked After Two Generals"  (1869, 12 pages)
"The Eagle as Patron of the Arts"  (1886,  11 pages)

Two Stories by Mikhail Saltykov

19th Century Comic Writer

Mikhail Saltykov (1826 to 1889 St Petersburg Russian-also known as Mikhail Saltykov-Schedrin) was born on the estate owned by his family, ancient Russian nobility.   He came early to love the reading life.   He attended a school for sons of Nobility where he began to translate writers like Byron and produce his own stories.     Upon getting out of school he entered government service.   His civil service career had its ups and downs but he ended up with  a pretty high positions as a  director of tax collection, probably as hated a bureaucratic position as there was in Czarist Russian in the provinces during the 19th century.   

Saltykov was very productive as a writer.   His most famous work is his novel The Golovlyov Family (1876) which has been called the gloomiest work in the history of Russian literature (and if that is true it is saying an awful lot!)   

Like Ivan Krylov he is mostly still loved for his fable like short stories.    I was very happy to see two of his stories were included in One World Classics edition of Why the Two Ivans Quarrelled by Nikolai Gogol and Other Russian Comic Stories as he is a new to me writer.     Saltykov's works are mostly thinly veiled jibes at the follies and life styles of the Russian provincial elite.   I really liked both of the stories of his I read a lot.   They are kind of like a fables working on becoming  short stories.   I concede from his painting one would not think he was such a funny writer!

"A Tale of How One Muzhik Looked After Two Generals"  is really a lot of fun even while it shows us the total contempt in which two Russian Generals (you did not work your way up in the ranks in the Russian Army under the Czar!) held the muzhiks (term for Russian peasant).    The two generals are kind of friends.   Neither of them has any conception how to do anything of a practical nature as they have always left that to the muzhiks.   I think it took either a bit of nerve (or some serious Imperial protection) to start a story like this in 1869 in Russia

"Once upon a time there were two generals.   They were both nitwits, and so in no time at all, by a wave of some magic wand, they found themselves on a desert island".  

  The two generals have no idea how to survive.   Sort of like dumb and dumber Romanov style.   At last they come up with an idea, find a Muzhik and let him do all the work.   They find one who is completely docile and subservient.   The generals treat him with complete contempt and abuse.   They barely see him as human.   As their reward for saving them when they get off the island they give him  five kopeks and a small glass of vodka.   

"The Eagle as Patron of the Arts"  is pretty much an Aesop type fable told through animal characters.    It is a pretty direct attack on the conventions of Russian society.   It is a darkly comic tale in which those in powers are seen as blood thirsty raptors.   There are satirical references to a number of social functionaries. I think this story is also pretty much of a slam on the Russian literary establishment as embodied in St Petersburg elite literary publications.   

An old translation of "A Tale of How One Muzhik Looked After Two Generals" can be found at Project Gutenburg.   I read it also.   It does not read as well as the translations in Why the Two Ivans Quarrelled by Nikolai Gogol and Other Russian Comic Stories.   I will be posting twice more on stories from this wonderful volume.   Both stories are translated by Guy Daniels.

I am really glad to have been introduced to Mikhail Saltykov and commend these stories to anyone at all interested in Russian literature.   Really anybody who likes a good story will enjoy these two works.

Mel u