World Literature
![Leo Tolstoy - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B000APWJOK.jpg)
Anna Karenina
The must-have Pevear and Volokhonsky translation of one of the greatest Russian novels ever written
Described by William Faulkner as the best novel ever written and by Fyodor Dostoevsky as "flawless," Anna Karenina tells of the doomed love affair between the sensuous and rebellious Anna and the dashing officer, Count Vronsky. Tragedy unfolds as Anna rejects her passionless marriage and thereby exposes herself to the hypocrisies of society. Set against a vast and richly textured canvas of nineteenth-century Russia, the novel's seven major characters create a dynamic imbalance, playing out the contrasts of city and country life and all the variations on love and family happiness.
While previous versions have softened the robust and sometimes shocking qualities of Tolstoy's writing, Pevear and Volokhonsky have produced a translation true to his powerful voice. This authoritative edition, which received the PEN Translation Prize and was an Oprah Book Club™ selection, also includes an illuminating introduction and explanatory notes. Beautiful, vigorous, and eminently readable, this Anna Karenina will be the definitive text for fans of the film and generations to come. This Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition also features French flaps and deckle-edged paper.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Described by William Faulkner as the best novel ever written and by Fyodor Dostoevsky as "flawless," Anna Karenina tells of the doomed love affair between the sensuous and rebellious Anna and the dashing officer, Count Vronsky. Tragedy unfolds as Anna rejects her passionless marriage and thereby exposes herself to the hypocrisies of society. Set against a vast and richly textured canvas of nineteenth-century Russia, the novel's seven major characters create a dynamic imbalance, playing out the contrasts of city and country life and all the variations on love and family happiness.
While previous versions have softened the robust and sometimes shocking qualities of Tolstoy's writing, Pevear and Volokhonsky have produced a translation true to his powerful voice. This authoritative edition, which received the PEN Translation Prize and was an Oprah Book Club™ selection, also includes an illuminating introduction and explanatory notes. Beautiful, vigorous, and eminently readable, this Anna Karenina will be the definitive text for fans of the film and generations to come. This Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition also features French flaps and deckle-edged paper.
For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
Editorial Reviews
"I finally finished Anna Karenina recently, in a translation by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. I think I can say without controversy that it's a great book." -Sally Rooney, The New York Times Book Review
Readers Top Reviews
Kindle Luke Denniso
I first read Anna Karenina 26 years ago and since then have always regarded it as the best novel I have ever read. Revisiting it half a lifetime later it still is that. Yes it could be shorter and there are a whole load of issues about what's included and maybe what's excluded but it travels effortlessly over the decades and centuries and has kept me and intellectually and emotionally engaged in 2019 as it did for that young man all those years ago. An essential read in any lifetime and one I will hopefully revisit in old age.
PoppyPetWoolco
Please note, I will not be reviewing the substance of Tolstoy’s work, merely the quality of this copy. If you want comprehensive reviews of books go to GoodReads, not amazon. This book aesthetically is extremely pleasant. I had been reading the book prior on my phone and because I was enjoying it so must decided to invest in a physical copy. The text is rather small but this is most likely due to the fact it is an extremely dense novel. However, personally I do not like the translation as I think they have really taken away from the charm of Tolstoy’s writing. See this sentence that struck me for comparison: This book - “Her face glowed with a bright glow; but this glow was not happy - it was like the terrible glow of a fire on a dark night” My online version - “Her face was brilliant and glowing; but this glow was not one of brightness, it suggested the fearful glow of a conflagration in the midst of a dark night” Personally I much prefer the latter as it is more visually rich, and therefore I actually would not recommend this book other than for the fact it’s cover looks nice. If you wish to have the language dulled down so as to make for a somewhat quicker read, then perhaps this version would best suit you.
BookLover07
****MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS**** If I could summarize this book in a quote in regards to Anna and Vronsky it would be this one: "I know no peace and cannot give you any...And I do not see any possibility of peace ahead either for me or for you. I see the possibility of despair, of unhappiness...or I see the possibility of happiness." That pretty much sums up their love affair and even though these words were spoken by Vronsky in the beginning of the novel, it served as a foreshadow of what was to come between him and Anna. I want to star by saying Im more of an emotional reader, although I do love analyzing classic books for meaning and being scholarly, I mostly go by my heart and the type of emotional response I get by learning about these characters and how their story unfolds. So my emotional side wants to give this story a solid 3 stars. I DO NOT LIKE READING BOOKS ABOUT CHEATING but made one of the rare exceptions with this book as my dear friend recommended it to me. I felt Anna and Vronsky were being selfish and I just couldn't sympathize with them. I know Karenin, Annas husband, was not exactly a cinnamon roll or the most passionate person on earth but at least he took care of her and their son. I do agree he wasn't emotionally available to Anna and she longed to be and feel loved and in a passionate relationship, but that passionate relationship is what ultimately unraveled her and sent her down a dark path. I do believe Anna suffered from a mental illness and I did feel pity for her in that sense. She was the product and consequence of the society she lived in who sadly was not kind to women in Annas position. This is why I gave the book a 5 star, Tolstoy had a way of making me hate her but pity her at the same time and even understand her. The raw human emotions expressed in this novel were truly wonderful. I felt what they felt and as I was reading it and I found myself thinking of the story even when I wasn’t reading it. When a book can do that to me thats how I know I will remember it always and will have a lasting impact on me. I personally hated Vronsky, I guess what he felt for Anna was "love" but I honestly didn't see it. Anna loved him way more than he did and towards the end he only thought of himself. However, Kitty and Levins story served as a contrast to Anna and Vronskys story and I LOVED IT SO MUCH!!!! Levin, faults and all, was a wonderful character to read and Kitty was a delight. There is a scene/part of the book where Levin dosnt want to take Kitty with him to see his dying brother but she's like Im going anyway (go Kitty!) and we get to see how amazing Kitty is. She took charge of the situation that Levin realized how valuable Kitty is. Another great part was when they confess their feeling for each other!!! That was super cute and romantic. There are a lot of more characters th...
joe m
I am absolutely in love with Leo T! This book has taken me on an emotional rollercoaster. I just finished reading the entire book. I hated when I got to the end. I wanted the story to continue forever. It has entertained me on every chapter and I am going to purchase more of his work. Awesome book and writer, I can't say enough of how good this book is. I have always stayed away from old clasics like this, because I thought they were too dated to enjoy. I was very wrong!!!!!
Antonio
I was amazed by how deeply Tolstoy describes his characters. His character's appearances, emotions, introspection, and development are extremely well-defined, and really sucked me into the novel and invested me into the characters. Some characters would treat another character badly, and I'd hate them. Other characters would do things and I'd cheer for them. It was quite a ride, and a long one at that, but definitely not a book you'll regret reading. I'm currently reading War and Peace, and though it is good, I think Tolstoy's development of characters, as well as the readability of the text in general, are much more well done in Anna Karenina than in War and Peace. Compared to Dostoevsky (my favorite of the two authors), I think Tolstoy's novels move more slowly and are a bit more distant in their descriptions. Nonetheless, Anna Karenina is read over a century later for a reason. You'll likely enjoy it, especially if you like a novel with good character development.
Short Excerpt Teaser
All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. All was confusion in the Oblonskys' house. The wife had found out that the husband was having an affair with their former French governess, and had announced to the husband that she could not live in the same house with him. This situation had continued for three days now, and was painfully felt by the couple themselves, as well as by all the members of the family and household. They felt that there was no sense in their living together and that people who meet accidentally at any inn have more connection with each other than they, the members of the family and household of the Oblonskys. The wife would not leave her rooms, the husband was away for the third day. The children were running all over the house as if lost; the English governess quarrelled with the housekeeper and wrote a note to a friend, asking her to find her a new place; the cook had already left the premises the day before, at dinner-time; the kitchen-maid and coachman had given notice.
On the third day after the quarrel, Prince Stepan Arkadyich Oblonsky - Stiva, as he was called in society - woke up at his usual hour, that is, at eight o'clock in the morning, not in his wife's bedroom but in his study, on a morocco sofa. He rolled his full, well-tended body over on the springs of the sofa, as if wishing to fall asleep again for a long time, tightly hugged the pillow from the other side and pressed his cheek to it; but suddenly he gave a start, sat up on the sofa and opened his eyes.
`Yes, yes, how did it go?' he thought, recalling his dream. `How did it go? Yes! Alabin was giving a dinner in Darmstadt - no, not in Darmstadt but something American. Yes, but this Darmstadt was in America. Yes, Alabin was giving a dinner on glass tables, yes - and the tables were singing Il mio tesoro, only it wasn't Il mio tesoro but something better, and there were some little carafes, which were also women,' he recalled.
Stepan Arkadyich's eyes glittered merrily, and he fell to thinking with a smile. `Yes, it was nice, very nice. There were many other excellent things there, but one can't say it in words, or even put it into waking thoughts.' And, noticing a strip of light that had broken through the side of one of the heavy blinds, he cheerfully dropped his feet from the sofa, felt for the slippers trimmed with gold morocco that his wife had embroidered for him (a present for last year's birthday), and, following a nine-year-old habit, without getting up, reached his hand out to the place where his dressing gown hung in the bedroom. And here he suddenly remembered how and why he was sleeping not in his wife's bedroom but in his study: the smile vanished from his face, and he knitted his brows.
`Oh, oh, oh! Ohh! ...' he moaned, remembering all that had taken place. And in his imagination he again pictured all the details of his quarrel with his wife, all the hopelessness of his position and, most painful of all, his own guilt.
`No, she won't forgive me and can't forgive me! And the most terrible thing is that I'm the guilty one in it all - guilty, and yet not guilty. That's the whole drama,' he thought. `Oh, oh, oh!' he murmured with despair, recalling what were for him the most painful impressions of this quarrel.
Worst of all had been that first moment when, coming back from the theatre, cheerful and content, holding a huge pear for his wife, he had not found her in the drawing room; to his surprise, he had not found her in the study either, and had finally seen her in the bedroom with the unfortunate, all-revealing note in her hand.
She - this eternally preoccupied and bustling and, as he thought, none-too-bright Dolly - was sitting motionless, the note in her hand, looking at him with an expression of horror, despair and wrath.
`What is this? this?' she asked, pointing to the note.
And, in recalling it, as often happens, Stepan Arkadyich was tormented not so much by the event itself as by the way he had responded to these words from his wife.
What had happened to him at that moment was what happens to people when they are unexpectedly caught in something very shameful. He had not managed to prepare his face for the position he found himself in with regard to his wife now that his guilt had been revealed. Instead of being offended, of denying, justifying, asking forgiveness, even remaining indifferent - any of which would have been better than what he did! - his face quite involuntarily (`reflexes of the brain', thought Stepan Arkadyich, w...
On the third day after the quarrel, Prince Stepan Arkadyich Oblonsky - Stiva, as he was called in society - woke up at his usual hour, that is, at eight o'clock in the morning, not in his wife's bedroom but in his study, on a morocco sofa. He rolled his full, well-tended body over on the springs of the sofa, as if wishing to fall asleep again for a long time, tightly hugged the pillow from the other side and pressed his cheek to it; but suddenly he gave a start, sat up on the sofa and opened his eyes.
`Yes, yes, how did it go?' he thought, recalling his dream. `How did it go? Yes! Alabin was giving a dinner in Darmstadt - no, not in Darmstadt but something American. Yes, but this Darmstadt was in America. Yes, Alabin was giving a dinner on glass tables, yes - and the tables were singing Il mio tesoro, only it wasn't Il mio tesoro but something better, and there were some little carafes, which were also women,' he recalled.
Stepan Arkadyich's eyes glittered merrily, and he fell to thinking with a smile. `Yes, it was nice, very nice. There were many other excellent things there, but one can't say it in words, or even put it into waking thoughts.' And, noticing a strip of light that had broken through the side of one of the heavy blinds, he cheerfully dropped his feet from the sofa, felt for the slippers trimmed with gold morocco that his wife had embroidered for him (a present for last year's birthday), and, following a nine-year-old habit, without getting up, reached his hand out to the place where his dressing gown hung in the bedroom. And here he suddenly remembered how and why he was sleeping not in his wife's bedroom but in his study: the smile vanished from his face, and he knitted his brows.
`Oh, oh, oh! Ohh! ...' he moaned, remembering all that had taken place. And in his imagination he again pictured all the details of his quarrel with his wife, all the hopelessness of his position and, most painful of all, his own guilt.
`No, she won't forgive me and can't forgive me! And the most terrible thing is that I'm the guilty one in it all - guilty, and yet not guilty. That's the whole drama,' he thought. `Oh, oh, oh!' he murmured with despair, recalling what were for him the most painful impressions of this quarrel.
Worst of all had been that first moment when, coming back from the theatre, cheerful and content, holding a huge pear for his wife, he had not found her in the drawing room; to his surprise, he had not found her in the study either, and had finally seen her in the bedroom with the unfortunate, all-revealing note in her hand.
She - this eternally preoccupied and bustling and, as he thought, none-too-bright Dolly - was sitting motionless, the note in her hand, looking at him with an expression of horror, despair and wrath.
`What is this? this?' she asked, pointing to the note.
And, in recalling it, as often happens, Stepan Arkadyich was tormented not so much by the event itself as by the way he had responded to these words from his wife.
What had happened to him at that moment was what happens to people when they are unexpectedly caught in something very shameful. He had not managed to prepare his face for the position he found himself in with regard to his wife now that his guilt had been revealed. Instead of being offended, of denying, justifying, asking forgiveness, even remaining indifferent - any of which would have been better than what he did! - his face quite involuntarily (`reflexes of the brain', thought Stepan Arkadyich, w...
