War and Peace Thursday: Done!

[osprey_archer]

"So too in history what is known to us we call the laws of necessity; what is unknown we call free will. Free will is for history only the expression for the unknown remainder of what we know of the laws of human life."

Tolstoy comes to a perfectly good ending halfway through his epilogue (which is of course a hundred pages long), but he just can't help himself: he tacks another twelve chapters on just in case we haven't quite understood his theory of history yet, and indeed it does clarify things, because it is only in this last section that he comes right out and says that he thinks the whole idea of free will is bogus, an illusion that masks the fact that history works out according to the ineluctable workings of natural laws.

In a way I admire him for sticking to a theory that he knows is going to be dreadfully unpopular (he compares it to Copernicus's theory that the earth revolves around the sun), but at the same time I wish he would have done it elsewhere. A pamphlet perhaps. Or he could have started his own magazine to expound on his theory of history. He's a count, he has the funds.

...I was going to go on a bit more about the goofiness of Tolstoy's theory of history - he seems to be singularly naive about how power works, for instance - but then I decided that it had probably all been said before and I didn't care enough to reread any of it in order to refute it.

So let's talk about Tolstoy's characters! Princess Marya manages to marry Nikolai Rostov, yesssss! I'm not convinced it's the best match ever - I don't think Nikolai has it in him to understand her, although to be fair Nikolai knows this and admires her fine qualities the more for it - but Princess Marya always wanted to get married and have children and has at last been granted this earthly happiness and I am happy for her.

It occurs to me that both of the big matches at the end of the book involve one partner who is more spiritual and intellectual and one who admires that quality from afar while being too down to earth and focused on the here and now to really understand it. Princess Marya and Nikolai Rostov, Pierre Bezukhov and Natasha Rostov.

In fact in a way both the Rostovs seem oddly diminished by their marriages; I noticed this more in the case of Natasha, because she goes all Happy Housewives in the epilogue (she doesn't sing anymore! Why doesn't she sing anymore?) but they both seem to have become more firmly staid and practical and, well, boring in their marriages than they ever were before.

Also I feel bad for poor Sonya, who is stuck living in her former betrothed's house as a sort of spinster aunt for his children, forced to watch Nikolai and Princess Marya be happy together and endure the fact that Princess Marya doesn't much like her. I don't even blame Princess Marya really - it's an impossible situation; of course there's friction - but still. Poor Sonya.

And she doesn't even have the solace of her best friend! Natasha has transferred her allegiance to Princess Marya, to whom she comments apropos Sonya, "She is a sterile flower, you know, like a strawberry blossom. Sometimes I feel so sorry for her, and at other times I think she doesn't feel as you or I would feel."

Well, that's a nice way to wash her hands of the matter. Poor Sonya; but then, she doesn't really feel anything, does she? At least it would be very convenient for everyone else if she didn't. Can't they at least try to marry her off to someone else?

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

It is very, very bothersome when men feel that they have to make marriage and children the pinnacle of a woman's experience--so much so that they'll gladly shed other aspects of their personality for this.

I guess at the time, it really was true for a lot of women, in a deeply pragmatic sense. It hardly matters if you are a great astronomer or are interested in how muscles work, or write poetry, if you aren't going to be able to survive without a husband. Yes, you can be supported by family, but they may resent you and treat you poorly and call you a sterile strawberry flower ... so I suppose male authors, seeing women of intelligence very willing to give up that in order to get married, would assume that yes, women like the married state best of all, wheee!

And how convenient to be able to dismiss a person who loses out on the marriage lottery as "not like us anyway." Grrr.

I don't really remember the book at all, as I've said before, but I remember being forewarned about Natasha's descent into housewifeliness by my mom, who really hated it.

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

Princess Marya doesn't seem to have shed her personality into generally housewifeliness the same way that Natasha does, so I'm not sure if Tolstoy is saying something about women in general in Natasha's characterization - and it's not like she ever had any desire to sing in public anyway - so it's not like marrying Pierre cut short a burgeoning career.

But still. I don't see why she doesn't still sing privately for her family, when she always loved singing so much and did it so well.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

*nodding*

People's interests do wax and wane, and having kids can certainly put interests on the back burner, but ... why mention it at all? If Tolstoy is seeing it as a good thing, why on earth is that? And if he's seeing it as a sad thing, even if only a small sad thing... that seems to work against the picture of marital happiness he's painting.

[evelyn-b.livejournal.com]

I love Tolstoy's uncanny gift for creating the perfect ending and then dumping a hundred more pages of "philosophy" on top of it. <3 He just can't help himself, and WHY SHOULD HE, HE HAS IDEAS. Wrongness like that is its own sublimity.

Natasha is such an asshole :( It's heartbreaking how everyone in the family just sort of resolves to take Sonya for granted. I wonder if way in the back of her mind, Natasha still resents Sonya for not letting her run off with what's-his-name and get ruined. Because Sonya doesn't understand real love like a real person, obviously. >:(

I actually love how "boring" and messy the Rostov marriages are; they feel really real to me, all weedy and full of thorns. I get why people hate it that Natasha doesn't sing anymore, but I was really surprised by how much I didn't - everything Tolstoy has to say about the proper purpose of a married woman or whatever is bullshit, but Natasha herself is 100% believable to me, so I'm ok with it.

If Sonya married someone else, where would they get all their free labor?? (wait) ok, where would they get free labor and emotional support from someone of their own social class? It's nice to be looked after, even if it is a bit awkward every second from time to time and SONYA'S A STERILE FLOWER ANYWAY so why bother?

(I like to think she reconnects with Dolokhov after he's had a couple of temporary and non-temporary revelations of his own, and they turn out to be perfect for each other).

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

I am envisioning Tolstoy as that guy at parties who tells really good stories, and his listeners are all satisfied and happy and ready to wander off to check out the hors d'oeurves... only oh wait, he's not done yet. He wants to elucidate the general moral of his story in case anyone missed it. For the next fifteen minutes.

I'm sure the whole failed elopement plays into Natasha's feeling that Sonya doesn't feel things like she does. Not that Natasha is sorry she was prevented from eloping, but still, Sonya betrayed her confidence in order to stop her, and acted really judgmental about Natasha's feelings too. In fact that might be the sticking point.

Possibly they both think that the other doesn't really feel things: Sonya is convinced Natasha can't really understand love, given how easily she broke faith with Prince Andrei, and Natasha is convinced likewise given that Sonya can't understand the coursing current of feelings that made her act that way.

It's funny - as a general observation, not particularly about War and Peace - how many people are convinced that they feel feelings with unique depth and intensity, and everyone else just Doesn't Understand.

And yes, I would be here for Sonya/Dolokhov. Presumably the war gave him a bit more depth of character, right? And perhaps nightmares. I bet Sonya would enjoying soothing his troubled brow when he wakes up from a nightmare.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

many people are convinced that they feel feelings with unique depth and intensity, and everyone else just Doesn't Understand.

Yep.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

The main things I have retained from my own reading of War & Peace is being a bit disappointed by Natasha's marriage and the general resolution of her story, and the utterly endless boring epilogue. So this is an excellent review! :D

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

I hate to say this because I love Pierre, but... after Prince Andrei, Pierre seems like a consolation prize. Prince Andrei had already not actually died twice! There was no reason for Tolstoy to kill him off in the end!