Anna Karenin - the greatest novel?

Having just read 'Anna Karenin' and Tolstoy for the first time, I found the ending a big let down, a fizzer, after 'The Idiot' and a few other Dostoevsky novels.

The entire ending, from Anna Karenin's suicide onward, teeters on the moralistic: Tolstoy is subtly preaching at me. The narration and Levin's reflections at the end seem almost arrogant. And I was hoping for the thunderbolt ending of a Dostoevsky novel! (I have also been reading the Australian author Patrick White, with endings as subtle and stunning as Dostoevsky's.)

I had expected Tolstoy’s focus would return to old Karenin, Vronsky, or at least to the unpredictable Kitty, but this was not to be.

I concede that Tolstoy paints Russian society and the predicament of characters in 'Anna Karenin' most elegantly and sympathetically. But am I wrong in seeing a psychological void behind that sumptuous veneer?

Tolstoy is "subtly" preaching? He's not subtle at all... the end of the story is pretty much the suicide, the rest is the epilogue, I don't see anything wrong. Also a novel doesn't have to have (especially the novels of Tolstoy) a punchy and surprising ending to be good, maybe that's what your looking for, but in the case of Tolstoy the value is the whole development, his writing, the story flows naturally, scene by scene, to form a whole, without seemingly any artifice.

I agree with you. I actually have never used this website before, but I was so disappointed with the last 30 or so pages after about 700 pages of incredible that I wanted to see if maybe I missed something. Like maybe someone else would have major insight into why he chose to blab on about religion after such a dramatic and tense few chapters. I suppose it would have been cruel of him to just end with the suicide, because the reactions were such a part of everything, but that really was the ending. Still, I wish he would have tied things together at the end and maybe had Levin and Kitty's reactions. I guess I felt like Kitty was starting to have a bit more dimension towards the end, I think it would have been nice to end with her thoughts.

Have you ever considered that Anna maybe is not the protagonist of this novel?
Also, return to Karenin would make all her acts useless. She had to die!

I have just finished reading the novel and I agree for me the novel went on to long. For me it really could have done with out the whole last section. In regards to Anna does anyone else think that the drugs were her problem not what she had done?

I finished Anna Karenina over six months ago, and I still can't stop thinking about the ending, and how much clarity it gave me for my life.

Consider where I was in my life while I was reading it: I had been working at my career for 8 years and was starting to think it was pointless, I was coming up to my marriage, and I was looking to move to a new town. In so many ways, the progress I made in my life over the months it took me to read the novel paralleled Levin's own journey.

At the end, Levin realizes the meaning in his life. And consequently he made me realize the meaning in my own. When Levin comes to terms with the truth he actually lies out in a field for 24 hours with the shock of it - and it was the same lightening bolt experience for me as a reader!

I believe that Anna Karenina is actually a story about Levin (who some say is an autobiographical version of Tolstoy), and that Anna's story is merely a method to get us to keep turning the pages.

I recommend coming back to Anna Karenina when you're going through a mid-life crisis!

I know that this is a bit of an old thread now, but I finished Anna Karenina last night, and I was so disappointed with the conclusion of the novel. I thought that in choosing to end the novel at that point, Tolstoy could have doen it pages and pages earlier. I think the gravity of Levin's realisations about the meaning of life and whatnot would have been more significant had he been on such a spiritual journey for a longer period of time rather than just the last part of the novel.
And I wanted to know how Karenin reacted to Anna's suicide, and how he felt towards Anna's daughter!

So I'm pretty much disappointed with Anna Karenina. :( .

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Originally Posted by BeckyC

I was so disappointed with the last 30 or so pages after about 700 pages of incredible that I wanted to see if maybe I missed something. Like maybe someone else would have major insight into why he chose to blab on about religion after such a dramatic and tense few chapters. I wish he would have tied things together at the end and maybe had Levin and Kitty's reactions. I guess I felt like Kitty was starting to have a bit more dimension towards the end, I think it would have been nice to end with her thoughts.

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Yes, I totally agree with you!

xx

It's one of THE best novels of all time!

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Originally Posted by amalia1985

It's one of THE best novels of all time!

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But what about the ending?! Do you like it?

xx

After that soppy ending, I'd need some convincing to tackle 'War and Peace'.

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Originally Posted by Gladys

I concede that Tolstoy paints Russian society and the predicament of characters in 'Anna Karenin' most elegantly and sympathetically. But am I wrong in seeing a psychological void behind that sumptuous veneer?

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The philosophy Tolstoy "preaches" through this novel reaches its conclusion after the death of Anna. Through Levin, Tolstoy (from the outset of the novel)
explores that half of the human soul searching for "the greater truth" which in principle supersedes personal desires and "pride of reasoning". One may argue that Levin's search for this truth was a selfish ambition to improve his own character, but I argue that since Tolstoy (clearly) portrays Levin as the novel's reluctant hero (in a moral sense), his search was genuine. The novel ends with Levin and his revelations of “truth” and consequently LIFE

Anna is the moral opposite of Levin. Through Anna Tolstoy explores pride and self seeking and its devastating consequences (you now the story). Anna destroyed everything that she held dear by valuing her self more important than life itself. It ends with DEATH.

To conclude: At the height of Levin's revelation he believes that all people are given the ability to love (this gift yields life [Levin & Kitty]) and that this gift may be destroyed by the pride of human reasoning (which leads to ruin & death [Anna's self deceiving thoughts regarding Vronsky's love])

No, no, no!!! What do you all dislike Anna? She is just like her brother; but nobody dislikes Stiva. Why is that?

I do not dislike Anna so much as I dislike Tolstoy's schematic intent in the novel. Anna is not Levin's moral opposite; Levin plays himself nearly as false as Anna, and considers the same suicide Anna is finally driven to commit. Levin is *saved* because he puts his soul in the land. Anna dies for being too European and worldly in her compromises. Although Vronsky hounded her, he ends up with a toothache and hopes he can actually be heroic in some last battle. What a price for Vronsky. Yes, I know a fallen woman is a stigma in 19th century literature, but that is little excuse for Tolstoy to destroy someone for delighting in her own physical sensations. Anna is not Emma Bovary. Anna was pursued by a selfish materialist, and the price for that was mortal, and as a thematic message I find it obscene.

Levin is saved because he is male and he represents Tolstoy's views.
I see that on online version there isn't intro quote; don't know about yours:

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Romans 12:19

19Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God's wrath, for it is written: "It is mine to avenge; I will repay,"[a]says the Lord.

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Tolstoy told us that we have no right to judge Anna; not only because of God but also because of her.
That's why I think Stiva is extremely important in the novel. He cheated his wife Dolly, almost divorced, haven't took any care for his kids, getting drunk almost every day while his family was in financial crisis; but no matter of all that he was well respected member of society. Anna haven't done nothing much different from him (and she had much much better reasons for that) but was disgraced and excluded from society. Vronski and Karenin acted like macho's and she suffered for all of them. But they felt bad at the end, at least some satisfaction. So, it's Russian literature so she had to die to prove a point. Pity.


It's really unfair to even consider her similar with Emma :flare: Bovary.

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Originally Posted by bazarov

No, no, no!!! What do you all dislike Anna? She is just like her brother; but nobody dislikes Stiva. Why is that?

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Actually, I do dislike Stiva! But I'm aware that I might be the only one. His constant 'almond-oil-coloured' smiling is like 365 days of summer in a year: the idea sounds great, but it really starts to get to you after a while. Also, for a character that appears so much throughout the novel (indeed, there's no setting he will deprive of the pleasure of his presence) and hence occupies so much narrative space as it were, he's remarkably flat.
My favourite character is probably Laska, the dog ;) And I guess Levin's alright.

As for the topic, I understand what you mean (I much prefer Dostoyevsky myself, although I've enjoyed what I've read of Tolstoy so far), and although Levin's ramblings were far from striking a chord as far as I'm concerned, I think it's a very pertinent way of ending the novel. Finishing with Anna's suicide would also have been a satisfying ending, one akin to Kafka's The Trial, but he have to tune to Tolstoy station when reading Tolstoy, I suppose ;)

I think the more subdued ending with Levin is appropriate. Bear in mind that the translation might make it sound more trite than it actually is.

I think this is an important quote to bear in mind when reading the ending:
And Levin, a happy father and husband, in perfect health, was several times so near suicide that he hid the cord that he might not be tempted to hang himself, and was afraid to go out with his gun for fear of shooting himself.

But Levin did not shoot himself, and did not hang himself; he went on living.

It is Levin's ability to endure, despite the many uncertainties of life, that saves him.

BUCKLE UP!

well...all the doc wants to type to his fellow tolstoy readers was that after he finished this one he let out one giant...

ROAR!