Dolly & Stiva

[dr_gonzo]

Hi everybody!
Do you think, considering how much Anna influences Dolly at the beginning of the novel, that there is a chance of Dolly leaving Stiva after Anna's suicide? After all, in Part 6 chapter 16 (as Dolly travels to meet Anna) she entertains the notion of leaving Stiva and having an affair, just like the woman that she looks up to.....

[Idril]

I think given how Anna's own affair turned out, Dolly was probably feeling pretty content where she was. And thinking about having an affair and actually having one are two completely different things, I just don't think Dolly had it in her to leave her Stiva no matter how lecherous he was and you never know, maybe Anna's death brought him around to seeing how destructive that behavior can be and he devoted himself to being a good husband and father...you never know, it could happen.

[dr_gonzo]

I think you're right - Dolly is too much of a society being to seriously consider leaving Stiva and having an affair. In that case, I think it's a terribly sad situation because she is stuck in a similar kind of false relationship to that of Anna & Karenin. (That said, I'd much prefer to be with Stiva than Karenin lol) I wonder if the right thing to do for Dolly is to stay with Stiva, even though she doesn't forgive him and he keeps cheating on her. I doubt Stiva would stop his adulterous ways after the death of his sister. I mean, there seems to be one standard for males and a different one for females.

[grace86]

Wasn't Dolly also considering her children? And that Stiva was a good father or something? I can't remember if when Dolly was contemplating having an affair if she was also thinking about what Anna was doing to her son?

Can't remember...can't remember!

[dr_gonzo]

Yup, she was thinking about her own children, but I'm not so sure if she thought about Anna's son. She sees the affair as liberating, so I doubt she's thought of the pain Anna is suffering at being away from her kids lol. Maybe she thinks it would be wonderful to escape the chains of having and raising children. I used to think Tolstoy was very misogynistic, but after re-reading that chapter (Part 6, 16) where he describes Dolly's thoughts about her "bondage" to the family, I think I might be wrong. Perhaps one of the greatest tragedies of Anna Karenina is that every woman in the novel suffers more than the men, and they have no choice but to suffer. Stiva doesn't have to care for his family or raise the kids like Dolly does. Anna can't live a lie with Karenin, nor can she have an affair and without her son. The men are free, but the women are bound in chains to a family life That was a big ramble sorry Dolly never thought of Stiva as a good father, she only thought "He is necessary to me." (6, 16) Is the novel misogynistic? I can't decide lol

[Idril]

I used to think Tolstoy was very misogynistic, but after re-reading that chapter (Part 6, 16) where he describes Dolly's thoughts about her "bondage" to the family, I think I might be wrong.

I think Tolstoy was very misogynistic, he did not have a very high opinion of women or of their usefullness and it's often surprising to me how well he wrote for Anna given those leanings of his. He really did write Anna with a great deal of sympathy...however, her desire for freedom and independence and true love did not have a good ending, in fact it brought about her destruction. The first time I read it, I thought the one of the statements he was making was that women were so repressed, the only way women were accepted in that society is for them to swallow their pride, like Dolly and accept marriage without love or respect and devote themselves to the raising of the children and live a sham of a life and wasn't that so sad? However, after reading a little more about Tolstoy the man and his beliefs, I'm beginning to think his statement was more along the lines of, "look at Anna, look at what longing for love and thinking you deserve an emotional life of your own leads to, look how all those who loved her suffered because of her selfishness, now, look at Dolly, her husband cheats on her, treats her like crap, but she realizes that's where she belongs so she stays and fulfills her duties as wife and mother and all is well with the world, she may not happy, but she realizes she doesn't have to be as long as her husband is happy and her children are cared for." I really think Tolstoy felt Dolly was the more admirable of the two and that her marriage was successfull despite it's troubles.

[dr_gonzo]

I haven't read much of Tolstoy's other writings, so I don't really know what beliefs are his own and what beliefs belong to the time in which he wrote Anna. Perhaps he was highlighting the misogynistic attitudes of late 19th c Russia, and not necessarily his own. I think this because of the way he writes Dolly's thoughts with (slight) sympathy, and the way he highlights the double standards for men and women in that society. The men are free, and the women have no choice but to be chained to a family life. I think he recognises the hypocrisy, and includes it in the novel, but doesn't agree with it. That is why Anna commits suicide - all her problems are caused by men, and she has no choice or way to change these problems because of the lack of power she holds as a woman in the 1800's. There is a line casually mentioned before her suicide: "the young men would not leave her alone" (7,30) (Hopefully Vronsky gets killed in the Serbian war lol )

[Idril]

I've read a lot of Tolstoy and read a biography of his and he really was pretty mysogynistic. His views on women were quite shocking at times but he was he was also a study in contradictions. It wasn't unusual for him to preach one thing and yet live in a completely different manner, like the concept of marital abstinance, which he believed was the pinnicle of being yet he and Sonya had 12 children so it's certainly possible that while he was mysogynistic in his own beliefs, he could step out of the mindset and take another view of the issue. It did say in the biography I read that he fell in love with Anna over the course of the novel, that at first he didn't like her and condemned her in the name of morality but that eventually, he came to love her and feel that she was mistreated. Although I still think, in real life, that Dolly was closer to his ideal of the perfect woman and he would've been quite intimidated and horrified by Anna...although I could certainly be wrong, it's been known to happen.

[dr_gonzo]

lol yeah. Tolstoy may be a great realist writer, but it is all from a relatively narrow minded male point of view. Are there any female writers that match Tolstoy's brilliance? Don't say Jane Austen lol