"Reply with Quote" ????

one_dryboot

Long Time Member
Messages
5,139
Well I have been around here a few years now and today is the first day I have noticed "Reply with quote" Sum Beech
Nvbighorn helped me to see the light up in the general forum. How many use it, and how many are like me and never saw it?

Thanks in advance
 
>Well I have been around here
>a few years now and
>today is the first day
>I have noticed "Reply with
>quote" Sum Beech
> Nvbighorn helped me
>to see the light up
>in the general forum. How
>many use it, and how
>many are like me and
>never saw it?
>
> Thanks in
>advance
>
>

I NEVER use it.

Eel
 
>>Well I have been around here
>>a few years now and
>>today is the first day
>>I have noticed "Reply with
>>quote" Sum Beech
>> Nvbighorn helped me
>>to see the light up
>>in the general forum. How
>>many use it, and how
>>many are like me and
>>never saw it?
>>
>> Thanks in
>>advance
>>
>>
>
>I NEVER use it.
>
>Eel
>

+1 Nv and Eel

I agree, I thought people were going to way too much trouble to quote a long azz post that most dont read.
 
>>>Well I have been around here
>>>a few years now and
>>>today is the first day
>>>I have noticed "Reply with
>>>quote" Sum Beech
>>> Nvbighorn helped me
>>>to see the light up
>>>in the general forum. How
>>>many use it, and how
>>>many are like me and
>>>never saw it?
>>>
>>> Thanks in
>>>advance
>>>
>>>
>>
>>I NEVER use it.
>>
>>Eel
>>
>
>+1 Nv and Eel
>
>I agree, I thought people were
>going to way too much
>trouble to quote a long
>azz post that most dont
>read.
 
LAST EDITED ON Mar-17-10 AT 10:22PM (MST)[p]Holy $hit! I actually made a difference in two people's lives today. I can't tell you how good that feels (tears welling up).
 
>i always wondered how y'all got
>that info from another persons
>post! what a dumb a$$...
>
>
>muleyman

Oops I mean:

Holy $hit! I actually made a difference in two people's lives today. I can't tell you how good that feels (tears welling up).
 
>Well I have been around here
>a few years now and
>today is the first day
>I have noticed "Reply with
>quote" Sum Beech
> Nvbighorn helped me
>to see the light up
>in the general forum. How
>many use it, and how
>many are like me and
>never saw it?
>
> Thanks in
>advance
>
>


LMAO BOOT!!!!!! You might also want to check out the Elk Forum. LOL
 
>>Well I have been around here
>>a few years now and
>>today is the first day
>>I have noticed "Reply with
>>quote" Sum Beech
>> Nvbighorn helped me
>>to see the light up
>>in the general forum. How
>>many use it, and how
>>many are like me and
>>never saw it?
>>
>> Thanks in
>>advance
>>
>>
>
>
>LMAO BOOT!!!!!! You might also want
>to check out the Elk
>Forum. LOL

Holy S.H.I.T, there is alot more to this site then just Fully clothed women and SFW posts. who knew?
Big Gulps huh? well see ya later!
 
>>i always wondered how y'all got
>>that info from another persons
>>post! what a dumb a$$...
>>
>>
>>muleyman
>
>Oops I mean:
>
>Holy $hit! I actually made a
>difference in two people's lives
>today. I can't tell you
>how good that feels (tears
>welling up).

Nv, I would offer you a cyber tissue but there is no crying on a hunting forum for gosh sakes!
On a side note, thanks for bringing this into my life! I feel complete.
 
>>>Well I have been around here
>>>a few years now and
>>>today is the first day
>>>I have noticed "Reply with
>>>quote" Sum Beech
>>> Nvbighorn helped me
>>>to see the light up
>>>in the general forum. How
>>>many use it, and how
>>>many are like me and
>>>never saw it?
>>>
>>> Thanks in
>>>advance
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>LMAO BOOT!!!!!! You might also want
>>to check out the Elk
>>Forum. LOL
>
>Holy S.H.I.T, there is
>alot more to this site
>then just Fully clothed women
>and SFW posts. who
>knew?
> Big Gulps
>huh? well see
>ya later!


http://www.monstermuleys.info/cgi-b...=show_thread&om=15813&forum=DCForumID5&omm=31

Now thats a Reply with Quote. :)
 
I may just use this as my signature




War and Peace (Russian: Война и мир, Voyn? i mir), a Russian novel by Leo Tolstoy, is considered one of the world's greatest works of fiction.[1] It is regarded, along with Anna Karenina (1873?1877), as his finest literary achievement.

Epic in scale, War and Peace delineates in graphic detail events leading up to Napoleon's invasion of Russia, and the impact of the Napoleonic era on Tsarist society, as seen through the eyes of five Russian aristocratic families.

Portions of an earlier version having been serialized in the magazine The Russian Messenger between 1865 and 1867, the novel was first published in its entirety in 1869.[2] Newsweek in 2009 ranked it top of its list of Top 100 Books.[3]

Tolstoy himself, somewhat enigmatically, said of War and Peace that it was "not a novel, even less is it a poem, and still less an historical chronicle."[4]

Contents [hide]
1 Crafting the novel
1.1 Realism
2 Reception
3 Language
3.1 English translations
4 Background and historical context
5 Plot summary
5.1 Book/Volume One
5.2 Book/Volume Two
5.3 Book/Volume Three
5.4 Book/Volume Four
5.5 Epilogues
6 Principal characters in War and Peace
7 Adaptations
7.1 Film
7.2 Opera
7.3 Music
7.4 Theatre
7.5 Radio and television
7.6 Full translations into English
8 See also
9 References
10 External links


[edit] Crafting the novel

An undated photograph of Leo Tolstoy dressed for the Russian weatherWar and Peace is famously long for a novel (though not the longest by any means). It is subdivided into four books or volumes, each with subparts containing many chapters.

Tolstoy got the title, and some of his themes, from an 1861 work of Proudhon: La Guerre et la Paix. Tolstoy had served in the Crimean War and written a series of short stories and novellas featuring scenes of war. He began writing War and Peace in the year that he finally married and settled down at his country estate. During the writing of the second half of the book, after the first half had already been written under the name "1805", he read widely, acknowledging Schopenhauer as one of his main inspirations, although he developed his own views of history and the role of the individual within it.[5]

The novel can be generally classified as historical fiction. It contains elements present in many types of popular 18th and 19th century literature, especially the romance novel. War and Peace attains its literary status by transcending genres. Tolstoy was instrumental in bringing a new kind of consciousness to the novel. His narrative structure is noted for its "god-like" ability to hover over and within events, but also swiftly and seamlessly to take a particular character's point of view.[6] His use of visual detail is often cinematic in its scope, using the literary equivalents of panning, wide shots and close-ups, to give dramatic interest to battles and ballrooms alike. These devices, while not exclusive to Tolstoy, are part of the new novel that is arising in the mid-19th century and of which Tolstoy proves himself a master.[7]

[edit] Realism
Tolstoy incorporated extensive historical research, and he was influenced by many other novels as well.[8] Himself a veteran of the Crimean War, Tolstoy was quite critical of standard history, especially the standards of military history, in War and Peace. Tolstoy read all the standard histories available in Russian and French about the Napoleonic Wars and combined more traditional historical writing with the novel form - he explains at the start of the novel's third volume his views on how history ought to be written. His aim was to blur the line between fiction and history, in order to get closer to the truth, as he states in Volume II.

The novel is set 60 years earlier than the time at which Tolstoy wrote it, "in the days of our grandfathers", as he puts it. He had spoken with people who had lived through the war of 1812 (In Russia), so the book is also, in part, accurate ethnography fictionalized. He read letters, journals, autobiographical and biographical materials pertaining to Napoleon and the dozens of other historical characters in the novel. There are approximately 160 real persons named or referred to in War and Peace.[9]

[edit] Reception
The first draft of War and Peace was completed in 1863. In 1865, the periodical Russkiy Vestnik published the first part of this early version under the title 1805 and the following year published more of the same early version. Tolstoy was increasingly dissatisfied with this version, although he allowed several parts of it to be published (with a different ending) in 1867 still under the title "1805" He heavily rewrote the entire novel between 1866 and 1869.[10] Tolstoy's wife Sophia Tolstoy handwrote as many as 8 or 9 separate complete manuscripts before Tolstoy considered it again ready for publication.[11] The version that was published in Russkiy Vestnik had a very different ending than the version eventually published under the title War and Peace in 1869.

The completed novel was then called Voyna i mir (new style orthography; in English War and Peace).

Tolstoy did not destroy the 1805 manuscript (sometimes referred to as "the original War and Peace"), which was re-edited and annotated in Russia in 1983 and since has been translated separately from the "known" version, to English, German, French, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Finnish and Korean. The fact that so many extant versions of War and Peace survive make it one of the best revelations into the mental processes of a great novelist.

Russians who had read the serialized version, were anxious to acquire the complete first edition, which included epilogues, and it sold out almost immediately. The novel was translated almost immediately after publication into many other languages.

Isaac Babel said, after reading War and Peace, "If the world could write by itself, it would write like Tolstoy."[12] Tolstoy "gives us a unique combination of the 'naive objectivity' of the oral narrator with the interest in detail characteristic of realism. This is the reason for our trust in his presentation."[13]

[edit] Language
Although Tolstoy wrote most of the book, including all the narration, in Russian, significant portions of dialogue (including its opening paragraph) are written in French and characters often switch between the languages. This reflected 19th century reality since Russian aristocracy in the early nineteenth century were conversant in French, which was often considered more refined than Russian?many were much less competent in Russian. An example in the novel is Julie Karagina, Princess Marya's friend, who has to take Russian lessons in order to master her native language.

It has been suggested[14] that it is a deliberate strategy of Tolstoy to use French to portray artifice and insincerity, as the language of the theater and deceit while Russian emerges as a language of sincerity, honesty and seriousness. When Pierre proposes to Helene he speaks to her in French?Je vous aime?and as the marriage emerges as a sham he blames those words.

As the book progresses, and the wars with the French intensify, culminating in the capture and eventual burning of Moscow, the use of French diminishes. The progressive elimination of French from the text is a means of demonstrating that Russia has freed itself from foreign cultural domination. It is also, at the level of plot development, a way of showing that a once-admired and friendly nation, France, has turned into an enemy. By midway through the book, several of the Russian aristocracy, whose command of French is far better than their command of Russian, are anxious to find Russian tutors for themselves.

[edit] English translations
War and Peace has been translated into English on several occasions, starting by Clara Bell working from a French translation. The translators Constance Garnett and Louise and Aylmer Maude knew Tolstoy personally. Translations have to deal with Tolstoy?s often peculiar syntax and his fondness of repetitions. About 2% of War and Peace is in French; Tolstoy removed the French in a revised 1873 edition, only to restore it later again.[15] Most translators follow Garnett retaining some French, Briggs uses no French, while Pevear-Volokhonsky retain the French fully.[15] (For a list of translations see below)

[edit] Background and historical context

In 1812 by the Russian artist Illarion PryanishnikovThe novel begins in the year 1805 and leads up to the war of 1812[citation needed]. The era of Catherine the Great is still fresh in the minds of older people. It was Catherine who ordered the Russian court to change to speaking French, a custom that was stronger in Petersburg than in Moscow.[citation needed] Catherine's son and successor, Paul I, is the father of the current Czar, Alexander I. Alexander I came to the throne in 1801 at the age of 24. His mother, Marya Feodorovna, is the most powerful woman in the court.

The novel tells the story of five aristocratic families ? the Bezukhovs, the Bolkonskys, the Rostovs, the Kuragins and the Drubetskoys?and the entanglements of their personal lives with the history of 1805?1813, principally Napoleon's invasion of Russia in 1812. The Bezukhovs, while very rich, are a fragmented family as the old Count, Kirill Vladimirovich, has fathered dozens of illegitimate sons. The Bolkonskys are an old established and wealthy family based at Bald Hills. Old Prince Bolkonsky, Nikolai Andreevich, served as a general under Catherine the Great, in earlier wars. The Moscow Rostovs have many estates, but never enough cash. They are a closely knit, loving family who live for the moment regardless of their financial situation. The Kuragin family has three children, who are all of questionable character. The Drubetskoy family is of impoverished nobility, and consists of an elderly mother and her only son, Boris, whom she wishes to push up the career ladder.

Tolstoy spent years researching and rewriting the book. He worked from primary source materials (interviews and other documents), as well as from history books, philosophy texts and other historical novels.[16] Tolstoy also used a great deal of his own experience in the Crimean War to bring vivid detail and first-hand accounts of how the Russian army was structured.[17]

The standard Russian text of 'War and Peace' is divided into four books (fifteen parts) and two epilogues ? one mainly narrative, the other thematic. While roughly the first half of the novel is concerned strictly with the fictional characters, the later parts, as well as one of the work's two epilogues, increasingly consist of essays about the nature of war, power, history, and historiography. Tolstoy interspersed these essays into the story in a way that defies previous fictional convention. Certain abridged versions remove these essays entirely, while others, published even during Tolstoy's life, simply moved these essays into an appendix.

[edit] Plot summary
War and Peace has a huge cast of characters, some historically real, like Napoleon and Alexander I, the majority of whom are introduced in the first book. The scope of the novel is vast, but the focus is primarily on five aristocratic families and their experiences in life. The interactions of these characters are set in the era leading up to, around and following the French invasion of Russia during the Napoleonic wars.[18]

[edit] Book/Volume One
The novel begins in Saint Petersburg, at a soir?e given in July 1805 by Anna Pavlovna Scherer ? the maid of honour and confidante to the queen mother Maria Feodorovna. Many of the main players and aristocratic families of the novel are introduced as they enter Anna Pavlovna's salon. Pierre (Pyotr Kirilovich) Bezukhov is the illegitimate son of a wealthy count, an elderly man who is dying after a series of strokes. He is about to become embroiled in a struggle for his inheritance. Educated abroad after his mother's death and at his father's expense, Pierre is essentially kindhearted, but socially awkward owing in part to his open, benevolent nature, and finds it difficult to integrate into Petersburg society. He is his father's favorite of all the old count's illegitimate children, and this is known to everyone at Anna Pavlovna's.

Pierre's friend, the intelligent and sardonic Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky, husband of the charming society favourite Lise, also attends the soire?. Finding Petersburg society unctuous and disillusioned with married life after discovering his wife is empty and superficial, Prince Andrei makes the fateful choice to be an aide-de-camp to Prince Mikhail Ilarionovich Kutuzov in the coming war against Napoleon.

The plot then moves to Moscow, Russia's ancient city and former capital, contrasting its provincial, more Russian ways to the highly mannered society of Petersburg. The Rostov family are introduced. Count Ilya Andreyevich Rostov has four adolescent children. Thirteen-year-old Natasha (Natalia Ilyinichna) believes herself in love with Boris Drubetskoy, a disciplined young man who is about to join the army as an officer. Twenty-year-old Nikolai Ilyich pledges his teenage love to Sonya (Sofia Alexandrovna), his fifteen-year-old cousin, an orphan who has been brought up by the Rostovs. The eldest child of the Rostov family, Vera Ilyinichna, is cold and somewhat haughty but has a good prospective marriage in a Russian-German officer, Adolf Karlovich Berg. Petya (Pyotr Ilyich) is nine and the youngest of the Rostov family; like his brother, he is impetuous and eager to join the army when of age. The heads of the family, Count Ilya Rostov and Countess Natalya Rostova, are an affectionate couple but forever worried about their disordered finances.

At Bald Hills, the Bolkonskys' country estate, Prince Andrei leaves his terrified, pregnant wife Lise with his eccentric father Prince Nikolai Andreyevich Bolkonsky and his devoutly religious sister Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya, and departs for the war.

The second part opens with descriptions of the impending Russian-French war preparations. At the Sch?ngrabern engagement, Nikolai Rostov, who is now conscripted as ensign in a squadron of hussars, has his first taste of battle. He meets Prince Andrei, whom he insults in a fit of impetuousness. Even more than most young soldiers, he is deeply attracted by Tsar Alexander's charisma. Nikolai gambles and socializes with his officer, Vasily Dmitrich Denisov, and befriends the ruthless and perhaps psychopathic Fyodor Ivanovich Dolokhov.

[edit] Book/Volume Two
Book Two begins with Nikolai Rostov briefly returning home to Moscow on home leave in early 1806. Nikolai finds the Rostov family facing financial ruin due to poor estate management. He spends an eventful winter at home, accompanied by his friend Denisov, his officer from the Pavlograd Regiment in which he serves. Natasha has blossomed into a beautiful young girl. Denisov falls in love with her, proposes marriage but is rejected. Although his mother pleads with Nikolai to find himself a good financial prospect in marriage, Nikolai refuses to accede to his mother's request. He promises to marry his childhood sweetheart, the dowry-less Sonya.

Pierre Bezukhov, upon finally receiving his massive inheritance, is suddenly transformed from a bumbling young man into the richest and most eligible bachelor in the Russian Empire. Despite rationally knowing that it is wrong, he proposes marriage with Prince Kuragin's beautiful and immoral daughter H?l?ne (Elena Vasilyevna Kuragina), to whom he is sexually attracted. H?l?ne, who is rumoured to be involved in an incestuous affair with her brother, the equally charming and immoral Anatol, tells Pierre that she will never have children with him. H?l?ne has an affair with Dolokhov, who mocks Pierre in public. Pierre loses his temper and challenges Dolokhov, a seasoned dueller and a ruthless killer, to a duel. Unexpectedly, Pierre wounds Dolokhov. H?l?ne denies her affair, but Pierre is convinced of her guilt and, after almost being violent to her, leaves her. In his moral and spiritual confusion, he joins the Freemasons, and becomes embroiled in Masonic internal politics. Much of Book Two concerns his struggles with his passions and his spiritual conflicts to be a better man. Now a rich aristocrat, he abandons his former carefree behavior and enters upon a philosophical quest particular to Tolstoy: how should one live a moral life in an ethically imperfect world? The question continually baffles and confuses Pierre. He attempts to liberate his serfs, but ultimately achieves nothing of note.

Pierre is vividly contrasted with the intelligent and ambitious Prince Andrei Bolkonsky. At the Battle of Austerlitz, Andrei is inspired by a vision of glory to lead a charge of a straggling army. He suffers a near fatal artillery wound. In the face of death, Andrei realizes all his former ambitions are pointless and his former hero Napoleon (who rescues him in a horseback excursion to the battlefield) is apparently as vain as himself.

Prince Andrei recovers from his injuries in a military hospital and returns home, only to find his wife Lise dying in childbirth. He is stricken by his guilty conscience for not treating Lise better when she was alive and is haunted by the pitiful expression on his dead wife's face. His child, Nikolenka, survives.

Burdened with nihilistic disillusionment, Prince Andrei does not return to the army but chooses to remain on his estate, working on a project that would codify military behavior and help solve some of the problems of Russian disorganization that he believes were responsible for the loss of life in battle on the Russian side. Pierre comes to visit him and brings new questions: where is God in this amoral world? Pierre is interested in panentheism and the possibility of an afterlife.

Pierre's estranged wife, H?l?ne, begs him to take her back, and against his better judgment he does. Despite her vapid shallowness, H?l?ne establishes herself as an influential hostess in Petersburg society.

Prince Andrei feels impelled to take his newly written military notions to Petersburg, naively expecting to influence either the Emperor himself or those close to him. Young Natasha, also in Petersburg, is caught up in the excitement of dressing for her first grand ball, where she meets Prince Andrei and briefly reinvigorates him with her vivacious charm. Andrei believes he has found purpose in life again and, after paying the Rostovs several visits, proposes marriage to Natasha. However, old Prince Bolkonsky, Andrei's father, dislikes the Rostovs, opposes the marriage, and insists on a year's delay. Prince Andrei leaves to recuperate from his wounds abroad, leaving Natasha initially distraught. She soon recovers her spirits, however, and Count Rostov takes her and Sonya to spend some time with a friend in Moscow.

Natasha visits the Moscow opera, where she meets H?l?ne and her brother Anatol. Anatol has since married a Polish woman whom he has abandoned in Poland. He is very attracted to Natasha and is determined to seduce her. H?l?ne and Anatol conspire together to accomplish this plan. Anatol kisses Natasha and writes her passionate letters, eventually establishing plans to elope. Natasha is convinced that she loves Anatol and writes to Princess Maria, Andrei's sister, breaking off her engagement. At the last moment, Sonya discovers her plans to elope and foils them. Pierre is initially shocked and horrified at Natasha's behavior, but comes to realize he has fallen in love with her himself. During the time when the Great Comet of 1811?2 streaks the sky, life appears to begin anew for Pierre.

Prince Andrei accepts coldly Natasha's breaking of the engagement. He tells Pierre that his pride will not allow him to renew his proposal of marriage. Shamed by her near-seduction and at the realisation that Andrei will not forgive her, Natasha makes a suicide attempt and is left seriously ill.

[edit] Book/Volume Three
With the help of her family, especially Sonya, and the stirrings of religious faith, Natasha manages to persevere in Moscow through this dark period. Meanwhile, the whole of Russia is affected by the coming showdown between Napoleon's troops and the Russian army. Pierre convinces himself through gematria that Napoleon is the Antichrist of the Book of Revelation. Old prince Bolkonsky dies of a stroke while trying to protect his estate from French marauders. No organized help from any Russian army seems available to the Bolkonskys, but Nikolai Rostov turns up at their estate in time to help put down an incipient peasant revolt. He finds himself attracted to Princess Maria, but remembers his promise to Sonya.

Back in Moscow, the war-obsessed Petya manages to snatch a loose piece of the Tsar's biscuit outside the Cathedral of the Assumption; he finally convinces his parents to allow him to enlist.

Napoleon himself is a main character in this section of the novel and is presented in vivid detail, as both thinker and would-be strategist. His toilette and his customary attitudes and traits of mind are depicted in detail. Also described are the well-organized force of over 400,000 French Army (only 140,000 of them actually French-speaking) which marches quickly through the Russian countryside in the late summer and reaches the outskirts of the city of Smolensk. Pierre decides to leave Moscow and go to watch the Battle of Borodino from a vantage point next to a Russian artillery crew. After watching for a time, he begins to join in carrying ammunition. In the midst of the turmoil he experiences firsthand the death and destruction of war. The battle becomes a hideous slaughter for both armies and ends in a standoff. The Russians, however, have won a moral victory by standing up to Napoleon's reputedly invincible army. For strategic reasons and having suffered grievous losses, the Russian army withdraws the next day, allowing Napoleon to march on to Moscow. Among the casualties are Anatol Kuragin and Prince Andrei. Anatol loses a leg, and Andrei suffers a cannon wound in the abdomen. Both are reported dead, but their families are in such disarray that no one can be notified.

[edit] Book/Volume Four
The Rostovs have waited until the last minute to abandon Moscow, even after it is clear that Kutuzov has retreated past Moscow and Muscovites are being given contradictory, often propagandistic, instructions on how to either flee or fight. Count Rostopchin is publishing posters, rousing the citizens to put their faith in religious icons, while at the same time urging them to fight with pitchforks if necessary. Before fleeing himself, he gives orders to burn the city. The Rostovs have a difficult time deciding what to take with them, and in the end load their carts with the wounded and dying from the Battle of Borodino. Unknown to Natasha, Prince Andrei is amongst the wounded.

When Napoleon's Grand Army finally occupies an abandoned and burning Moscow, Pierre takes off on a quixotic mission to assassinate Napoleon. He becomes an anonymous man in all the chaos, shedding his responsibilities by wearing peasant clothes and shunning his duties and lifestyle. The only people he sees while in this garb are Natasha and some of her family, as they depart Moscow. Natasha recognizes and smiles at him, and he in turn realizes the full scope of his love for her.

Pierre saves the life of a French officer who fought at Borodino, yet is taken prisoner by the retreating French after his attempted assassination of Napoleon. He becomes friends with a fellow prisoner, Platon Karataev, a peasant with a saintly demeanor, who is incapable of malice. In Karataev, Pierre finally finds what he has been seeking: an honest person of integrity (unlike the aristocrats of Petersburg society) who is utterly without pretense. Pierre discovers meaning in life simply by living and interacting with him. After witnessing French soldiers sacking Moscow and shooting Russian civilians arbitrarily, Pierre is forced to march with the Grand Army during its disastrous retreat from Moscow in the harsh Russian winter. After months of trial and tribulation?during which the fever-plagued Karataev is shot by the French?Pierre is finally freed by a Russian raiding party, after a small skirmish with the French that sees the young Petya Rostov killed in action.

Meanwhile, Andrei, wounded during Napoleon's invasion, has been taken in as a casualty and cared for by the fleeing Rostovs. He is reunited with Natasha and his sister Maria before the end of the war. Having lost all will to live, he forgives Natasha in a last act before dying.

As the novel draws to a close, Pierre's wife H?l?ne dies in a botched operation (implied to be an abortion). Pierre is reunited with Natasha, while the victorious Russians rebuild Moscow. Natasha speaks of Prince Andrei's death and Pierre of Karataev's. Both are aware of a growing bond between them in their bereavement. With the help of Princess Maria, Pierre finds love at last and, revealing his love after being released by his former wife's death, marries Natasha.

[edit] Epilogues
The first epilogue begins with the wedding of Pierre and Natasha in 1813. It is the last happy event for the Rostov family, which is undergoing a transition. Count Rostov dies soon after, leaving his eldest son Nikolai to take charge of the debt-ridden estate.

Nikolai finds himself with the task of maintaining the family on the verge of bankruptcy. His abhorrence at the idea of marrying for wealth almost gets in his way, but finally in spite of rather than according to his mother's wishes, he marries the now-rich Maria Bolkonskaya and in so doing also saves his family from financial ruin.

Nikolai and Maria then move to Bald Hills with his mother and Sonya, whom he supports for the rest of their life. Buoyed by his wife's fortune, Nikolai pays off all his family's debts. They also raise Prince Andrei's orphaned son, Nikolai Andreyevich (Nikolenka) Bolkonsky.

As in all good marriages, there are misunderstandings, but the couples?Pierre and Natasha, Nikolai and Maria?remain devoted to their spouses. Pierre and Natasha visit Bald Hills in 1820, much to the jubilation of everyone concerned. There is a hint in the closing chapters that the idealistic, boyish Nikolenka and Pierre would both become part of the Decembrist Uprising. The first epilogue concludes with Nikolenka promising he would do something with which even his late father "would be satisfied..." (presumably as a revolutionary in the Decembrist revolt).

The second epilogue contains Tolstoy's critique of all existing forms of mainstream history. He attempts to show that there is a great force behind history, which he first terms divine. He offers the entire book as evidence of this force, and critiques his own work. God, therefore, becomes the word Tolstoy uses to refer to all the forces that produce history, taken together and operating behind the scenes.

[edit] Principal characters in War and Peace
Main article: List of characters in War and Peace

War and Peace character treeCount Pyotr Kirillovich (Pierre) Bezukhov ? The central character and often a voice for Tolstoy's own beliefs or struggles. He is one of several illegitimate children of Count Bezukhov; he is his father's favorite offspring.
Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky ? A strong but cynical, thoughtful and philosophical aide-de-camp in the Napoleonic Wars.
Princess Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya ? A pious woman whose eccentric father attempted to give her a good education. The caring, nurturing nature of her large eyes in her otherwise thin and plain face are frequently mentioned.
Count Ilya Andreyevich Rostov ? The pater-familias of the Rostov family; terrible with finances, generous to a fault.
Countess Natalya Rostova ? Wife of Count Ilya Rostov, mother of the four Rostov children.
Countess Natalia Ilyinichna (Natasha) Rostova ? Introduced as a beautiful and romantic young girl, she evolves through trials and suffering and eventually finds happiness. She is an accomplished singer and dancer.[citation needed]
Count Nikolai Ilyich Rostov ? A hussar, the beloved eldest son of the Rostov family.
Sofia Alexandrovna (Sonya) Rostova ? Orphaned cousin of Vera, Nikolai, Natasha and Petya Rostov.
Countess Vera Ilyinichna Rostova ? Eldest of the Rostov children, she marries the German career soldier, Berg.
Pyotr Ilyich (Petya) Rostov ? Youngest of the Rostov children.
Prince Vasily Sergeyevich Kuragin ? A ruthless man who is determined to marry his children well, despite having doubts about the character of some of them.
Princess Elena Vasilyevna (H?l?ne) Kuragina ? A beautiful and sexually alluring woman who has many affairs, including (it is rumoured) with her brother Anatole
Prince Anatol Vasilyevich Kuragin ? H?l?ne's brother and a very handsome, ruthless and amoral pleasure seeker who is secretly married yet tries to elope with Natasha Rostova.
Prince Ipolit Vasilyevich ? The eldest and perhaps most dim-witted of the Kuragin children.
Prince Boris Drubetskoy ? A poor but aristocratic young man who is determined to make his career, even at the expense of his friends and benefactors, marries a rich and ugly woman to help him climb the social ladder.
Princess Anna Mikhailovna Drubetskoya ? The mother of Boris.
Fyodor Ivanovich Dolokhov ? A cold, almost psychopathic officer, he ruins Nikolai Rostov after his proposal to Sonya is refused, he only shows love to his doting mother.
Adolf Karlovich Berg ? A young Russian officer, who desires to be just like everyone else.
Anna Pavlovna Sherer ? Also known as Annette, she is the hostess of the salon that is the site of much of the novel's action in Petersburg.
Maria Dmitryevna Akhrosimova ? An older Moscow society lady, she is an elegant dancer and trend-setter, despite her age and size.
Amalia Evgenyevna Bourienne ? A French woman who lives with the Bolkonskys, primarily as Princess Marya's companion.
Vasily Dmitrich Denisov ? Nikolai Rostov's friend and brother officer, who proposes to Natasha.
Platon Krataev - The archetypal good Russian peasant, whom Pierre meets in the prisoner of war camp.
Napoleon I of France ? the Great Man, whose fate is detailed in the book.
General Mikhail Ilarionovich Kutuzov ? Russian commander-in-chief throughout the book. His diligence and modesty eventually save Russia from Napoleon.[citation needed]
Osip Bazdeyev ? the Freemason who interests Pierre in his mysterious group, starting a lengthy subplot.[citation needed]
Tsar Alexander I of Russia ? He signed a peace treaty with Napoleon in 1807 and then went to war with him.
Many of Tolstoy's characters in War and Peace were based on real-life people known to Tolstoy himself. His grandparents and their friends were the models for many of the main characters, his great-grandparents would have been of the generation of Prince Vasilly or Count Ilya Rostov. Some of the characters, obviously, are actual historic figures.

[edit] Adaptations
[edit] Film
The first Russian film adaptation of War and Peace was the 1915 film Война и мир (Voyna i mir), directed by Vladimir Gardin and starring Gardin and the Russian ballerina Vera Karalli. It was followed in 1968 by the critically acclaimed four-part film version War and Peace, by the Soviet director Sergei Bondarchuk, released individually in 1965-1967, and as a re-edited whole in 1968. This starred Lyudmila Savelyeva (as Natasha Rostova) and Vyacheslav Tikhonov (as Andrei Bolkonsky). Bondarchuk himself played the character of Pierre Bezukhov. The film was almost seven hours long; it involved thousands of actors, 120 000 extras, and it took seven years to finish the shooting, as a result of which the actors age changed dramatically from scene to scene. It won an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film for its authenticity and massive scale. [2]

The novel has been adapted twice for cinema outside of Russia. The first of these was produced by F. Kamei in Japan (1947). The second was the 208-minute long 1956 War and Peace, directed by the American King Vidor. This starred Audrey Hepburn (Natasha), Henry Fonda (Pierre) and Mel Ferrer (Andrei). Audrey Hepburn was nominated for a BAFTA Award for best British actress and for a Golden Globe Award for best actress in a drama production.

[edit] Opera
Initiated by a proposal of the German director Erwin Piscator in 1938, the Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev composed his opera War and Peace based on this epic novel during the 1940s. The complete musical work premiered in Leningrad in 1955. It was the first opera to be given a public performance at the Sydney Opera House (1973).[19]
[edit] Music
War and Peace (Op. 91) (Russian: Война и мир, Voyna i mir) is an opera by Sergei Prokofiev, with a libretto by Mira Mendelson, and is based on the novel.
Composition by Nino Rota [3]
Referring to album notes on http://www.yesworld.com/, the first track "The Gates of Delirium", from the album Relayer, by the progressive rock group Yes, is said to be based loosely on the novel.
[edit] Theatre
The first successful stage adaptations of War and Peace were produced by Alfred Neumann and Erwin Piscator (1942, revised 1955, published by Macgibbon & Kee in London 1963, and staged in 16 countries since) and R. Lucas (1943).

A stage adaptation by Helen Edmundson, first produced in 1996 at the Royal National Theatre, was published that year by Nick Hern Books, London. Edmundson added to and amended the play[4] for a 2008 production as two 3-hour parts by Shared Experience, directed by Nancy Meckler and Polly Teale.[5] This was first put on at the Nottingham Playhouse, then toured in the UK to Liverpool, Darlington, Bath, Warwick, Oxford, Truro, London (the Hampstead Theatre) and Cheltenham.

On the 15th-18th july, The Birmingham Theatre School performed this 7 hour epic play at The Crescent Theatre in Brindleyplace with great success. Birmingham Theatre School is the only drama school in the world to perform the new adaptation of War and Peace. Directed by Chris Rozanski and Assistant to Director was Royal National Theatre performer Anthony Mark Barrow with Vocals arranged by Dr Ria Keen and choreography by Colin Lang.

[edit] Radio and television
In December 1970, Pacifica Radio station WBAI broadcast a reading of the entire novel (the 1968 Dunnigan translation) read by over 140 celebrities and ordinary people. [6]
War and Peace (1972): The BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) made a television serial based on the novel, broadcast in 1972-73. Anthony Hopkins played the lead role of Pierre. Other lead characters were played by Rupert Davies, Faith Brook, Morag Hood, Alan Dobie, Angela Down and Sylvester Morand. This version faithfully included many of Tolstoy's minor characters, including Platon Karataev (Harry Locke). [7], [8]
A dramatized full-cast adaptation in ten parts was written by Marcy Kahan and Mike Walker in 1997. The production won the 1998 Talkie award for Best Drama and was around 9.5 hours in length. It was directed by Janet Whitaker and featured Simon Russell Beale, Gerard Murphy, Richard Johnson, and others.[20]
La Guerre et la paix (TV) (2000) by Fran?ois Roussillon. Robert Brubaker played the lead role of Pierre.[9]
War and Peace (2007): produced by the Italian Lux Vide, a TV mini-series in Russian & English co-produced in Russia, France, Germany, Poland and Italy. Directed by Robert Dornhelm, with screenplay written by Lorenzo Favella, Enrico Medioli and Gavin Scott. It features an international cast with Alexander Beyer playing the lead role of Pierre assisted by Malcolm McDowell, Cl?mence Po?sy, Alessio Boni, Pilar Abella, J. Kimo Arbas, Ken Duken, Juozapas Bagdonas and Toni Bertorelli.[10]
[edit] Full translations into English
Clara Bell (from a French version) 1885-86
W. H. Dole 1889
Leo Wiener 1904
Constance Garnett (1904)
Louise and Aylmer Maude (1922-3)
Rosemary Edmonds (1957, revised 1978)
Ann Dunnigan (1968)
Anthony Briggs (2005)
Andrew Bromfield (2007), translation of the first completed draft, approx. 400 pages shorter than other English translations.[3]
Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (2007)
[edit] See also
List of characters in War and Peace
List of historical novels
Natasha's Dance by Orlando Figes, a cultural history of Russia using the name of the main female character [11]
[edit] References
^ Moser, Charles. 1992. Encyclopedia of Russian Literature. Cambridge University Press. Pp. 298?300.; Thirwell, Adam. 2005. "A masterpiece in miniature." London: Guardian UK, October 8; Briggs, Anthony. 2005. "Introduction" to War and Peace. Penguin Classics.
^ Knowles, A.V. Leo Tolstoy, Routledge 1997.
^ Newsweek's Top 100 Books: The Meta-List, retrieved on 07 July 2009
^ "Introduction?". War and Peace. Wordsworth Editions. 1993. http://books.google.com/books?id=c4...mcH3Cw&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=3&ct=result. Retrieved 2009-03-24.
^ Feuer, Kathryn.
^ Emerson, Caryl. 1985. "The Tolstoy Connection in Bakhtin", in PMLA, Vol 100, No 1, pp. 69-71. Modern Language Association.
^ Emerson, Caryl. 1985. Ibid, p. 68-69
^ Feuer, Kathryn B. 1996
^ Pearson and Volokhonsky op cit.
^ cf. Knowles 1997, Feuer 1996
^ Feuer 1996
^ "Introduction to War and Peace" by Richard Peaver in Peaver, Richard and Larissa Volokhonsky, War and Peace, 2008, Vintage Classics.
^ Greenwood, Edward Baker (1980). "What is War and Peace?". Tolstoy: The Comprehensive Vision. London: Taylor & Francis. p. 83. ISBN 0416741304. http://books.google.com/books?id=ta...tcover&hl=ru&source=gbs_summary_r&cad&pg=PA83.
^ Figes, O, Tolstoy's Real Hero. NYRB 22 Nov 2007,pp 4-7.
^ a b Figes O (November 22, 2007). "Tolstoy?s Real Hero". The New York Review of Books, Volume 54, Number 18.
^ Feuer, Kathryn B. Tolstoy and the Genesis of War and Peace, Cornell University Press, 1996 (First Edition)
^ Troyat, Henri. Tolstoy, a biography. Doubleday, 1967.
^ [1]
^ Sydney Opera House: History - highlights
^ "Marcy Kahan Radio Plays". War And Peace (Radio Dramatization). http://web.ukonline.co.uk/suttonelms/mkahan.html. Retrieved 2010-01-20.
[edit] External links
Wikisource has original text related to this article:
War and Peace
English translation at gutenberg
Searchable version of the gutenberg text in multiple formats SiSU
War and Peace, complete text with accompanying audio.
Full text of War and Peace in modern Russian orthography
An audio version of Book 1 of War and Peace (other books are available through links).
A searchable online version of Aylmer Maude's English translation of War and Peace
SparkNotes Study Guide for "War and Peace"
Birth, death, balls and battles by Orlando Figes. This is an edited version of an essay found in the Penguin Classics new translation of War and Peace (2005).
Homage to War and Peace Searchable map, compiled by Nicholas Jenkins, of places named in Tolstoy's novel (2008).
Russian Army during the Napoleonic Wars
The War and Peace Broadcast: 35th Anniversary, from Pacifica Radio Archives site
War and Peace at the Internet Book List
Radio documentary about 1970 marathon reading of War and Peace on WBAI, from Democracy Now! program, December 6, 2005
Disscusion-Forum at Reading Group Guides
 
>
>I may just use this as
>my signature

>
>
>
>
>War and Peace (Russian: Война и
>мир, Voyn? i mir), a
>Russian novel by Leo Tolstoy,
>is considered one of the
>world's greatest works of fiction.[1]
>It is regarded, along with
>Anna Karenina (1873?1877), as his
>finest literary achievement.
>
>Epic in scale, War and Peace
>delineates in graphic detail events
>leading up to Napoleon's invasion
>of Russia, and the impact
>of the Napoleonic era on
>Tsarist society, as seen through
>the eyes of five Russian
>aristocratic families.
>
>Portions of an earlier version having
>been serialized in the magazine
>The Russian Messenger between 1865
>and 1867, the novel was
>first published in its entirety
>in 1869.[2] Newsweek in 2009
>ranked it top of its
>list of Top 100 Books.[3]
>
>
>Tolstoy himself, somewhat enigmatically, said of
>War and Peace that it
>was "not a novel, even
>less is it a poem,
>and still less an historical
>chronicle."[4]
>
>Contents [hide]
>1 Crafting the novel
>1.1 Realism
>2 Reception
>3 Language
>3.1 English translations
>4 Background and historical context
>5 Plot summary
>5.1 Book/Volume One
>5.2 Book/Volume Two
>5.3 Book/Volume Three
>5.4 Book/Volume Four
>5.5 Epilogues
>6 Principal characters in War and
>Peace
>7 Adaptations
>7.1 Film
>7.2 Opera
>7.3 Music
>7.4 Theatre
>7.5 Radio and television
>7.6 Full translations into English
>8 See also
>9 References
>10 External links
>
>
>[edit] Crafting the novel
>
>An undated photograph of Leo Tolstoy
>dressed for the Russian weatherWar
>and Peace is famously long
>for a novel (though not
>the longest by any means).
>It is subdivided into four
>books or volumes, each with
>subparts containing many chapters.
>
>Tolstoy got the title, and some
>of his themes, from an
>1861 work of Proudhon: La
>Guerre et la Paix. Tolstoy
>had served in the Crimean
>War and written a series
>of short stories and novellas
>featuring scenes of war. He
>began writing War and Peace
>in the year that he
>finally married and settled down
>at his country estate. During
>the writing of the second
>half of the book, after
>the first half had already
>been written under the name
>"1805", he read widely, acknowledging
>Schopenhauer as one of his
>main inspirations, although he developed
>his own views of history
>and the role of the
>individual within it.[5]
>
>The novel can be generally classified
>as historical fiction. It contains
>elements present in many types
>of popular 18th and 19th
>century literature, especially the romance
>novel. War and Peace attains
>its literary status by transcending
>genres. Tolstoy was instrumental in
>bringing a new kind of
>consciousness to the novel. His
>narrative structure is noted for
>its "god-like" ability to hover
>over and within events, but
>also swiftly and seamlessly to
>take a particular character's point
>of view.[6] His use of
>visual detail is often cinematic
>in its scope, using the
>literary equivalents of panning, wide
>shots and close-ups, to give
>dramatic interest to battles and
>ballrooms alike. These devices, while
>not exclusive to Tolstoy, are
>part of the new novel
>that is arising in the
>mid-19th century and of which
>Tolstoy proves himself a master.[7]
>
>
>[edit] Realism
>Tolstoy incorporated extensive historical research, and
>he was influenced by many
>other novels as well.[8] Himself
>a veteran of the Crimean
>War, Tolstoy was quite critical
>of standard history, especially the
>standards of military history, in
>War and Peace. Tolstoy read
>all the standard histories available
>in Russian and French about
>the Napoleonic Wars and combined
>more traditional historical writing with
>the novel form - he
>explains at the start of
>the novel's third volume his
>views on how history ought
>to be written. His aim
>was to blur the line
>between fiction and history, in
>order to get closer to
>the truth, as he states
>in Volume II.
>
>The novel is set 60 years
>earlier than the time at
>which Tolstoy wrote it, "in
>the days of our grandfathers",
>as he puts it. He
>had spoken with people who
>had lived through the war
>of 1812 (In Russia), so
>the book is also, in
>part, accurate ethnography fictionalized. He
>read letters, journals, autobiographical and
>biographical materials pertaining to Napoleon
>and the dozens of other
>historical characters in the novel.
>There are approximately 160 real
>persons named or referred to
>in War and Peace.[9]
>
>[edit] Reception
>The first draft of War and
>Peace was completed in 1863.
>In 1865, the periodical Russkiy
>Vestnik published the first part
>of this early version under
>the title 1805 and the
>following year published more of
>the same early version. Tolstoy
>was increasingly dissatisfied with this
>version, although he allowed several
>parts of it to be
>published (with a different ending)
>in 1867 still under the
>title "1805" He heavily rewrote
>the entire novel between 1866
>and 1869.[10] Tolstoy's wife Sophia
>Tolstoy handwrote as many as
>8 or 9 separate complete
>manuscripts before Tolstoy considered it
>again ready for publication.[11] The
>version that was published in
>Russkiy Vestnik had a very
>different ending than the version
>eventually published under the title
>War and Peace in 1869.
>
>
>The completed novel was then called
>Voyna i mir (new style
>orthography; in English War and
>Peace).
>
>Tolstoy did not destroy the 1805
>manuscript (sometimes referred to as
>"the original War and Peace"),
>which was re-edited and annotated
>in Russia in 1983 and
>since has been translated separately
>from the "known" version, to
>English, German, French, Spanish, Dutch,
>Swedish, Finnish and Korean. The
>fact that so many extant
>versions of War and Peace
>survive make it one of
>the best revelations into the
>mental processes of a great
>novelist.
>
>Russians who had read the serialized
>version, were anxious to acquire
>the complete first edition, which
>included epilogues, and it sold
>out almost immediately. The novel
>was translated almost immediately after
>publication into many other languages.
>
>
>Isaac Babel said, after reading War
>and Peace, "If the world
>could write by itself, it
>would write like Tolstoy."[12] Tolstoy
>"gives us a unique combination
>of the 'naive objectivity' of
>the oral narrator with the
>interest in detail characteristic of
>realism. This is the reason
>for our trust in his
>presentation."[13]
>
>[edit] Language
>Although Tolstoy wrote most of the
>book, including all the narration,
>in Russian, significant portions of
>dialogue (including its opening paragraph)
>are written in French and
>characters often switch between the
>languages. This reflected 19th century
>reality since Russian aristocracy in
>the early nineteenth century were
>conversant in French, which was
>often considered more refined than
>Russian?many were much less competent
>in Russian. An example in
>the novel is Julie Karagina,
>Princess Marya's friend, who has
>to take Russian lessons in
>order to master her native
>language.
>
>It has been suggested[14] that it
>is a deliberate strategy of
>Tolstoy to use French to
>portray artifice and insincerity, as
>the language of the theater
>and deceit while Russian emerges
>as a language of sincerity,
>honesty and seriousness. When Pierre
>proposes to Helene he speaks
>to her in French?Je vous
>aime?and as the marriage emerges
>as a sham he blames
>those words.
>
>As the book progresses, and the
>wars with the French intensify,
>culminating in the capture and
>eventual burning of Moscow, the
>use of French diminishes. The
>progressive elimination of French from
>the text is a means
>of demonstrating that Russia has
>freed itself from foreign cultural
>domination. It is also, at
>the level of plot development,
>a way of showing that
>a once-admired and friendly nation,
>France, has turned into an
>enemy. By midway through the
>book, several of the Russian
>aristocracy, whose command of French
>is far better than their
>command of Russian, are anxious
>to find Russian tutors for
>themselves.
>
>[edit] English translations
>War and Peace has been translated
>into English on several occasions,
>starting by Clara Bell working
>from a French translation. The
>translators Constance Garnett and Louise
>and Aylmer Maude knew Tolstoy
>personally. Translations have to deal
>with Tolstoy?s often peculiar syntax
>and his fondness of repetitions.
>About 2% of War and
>Peace is in French; Tolstoy
>removed the French in a
>revised 1873 edition, only to
>restore it later again.[15] Most
>translators follow Garnett retaining some
>French, Briggs uses no French,
>while Pevear-Volokhonsky retain the French
>fully.[15] (For a list of
>translations see below)
>
>[edit] Background and historical context
>
>In 1812 by the Russian artist
>Illarion PryanishnikovThe novel begins in
>the year 1805 and leads
>up to the war of
>1812[citation needed]. The era of
>Catherine the Great is still
>fresh in the minds of
>older people. It was Catherine
>who ordered the Russian court
>to change to speaking French,
>a custom that was stronger
>in Petersburg than in Moscow.[citation
>needed] Catherine's son and successor,
>Paul I, is the father
>of the current Czar, Alexander
>I. Alexander I came to
>the throne in 1801 at
>the age of 24. His
>mother, Marya Feodorovna, is the
>most powerful woman in the
>court.
>
>The novel tells the story of
>five aristocratic families ? the
>Bezukhovs, the Bolkonskys, the Rostovs,
>the Kuragins and the Drubetskoys?and
>the entanglements of their personal
>lives with the history of
>1805?1813, principally Napoleon's invasion of
>Russia in 1812. The Bezukhovs,
>while very rich, are a
>fragmented family as the old
>Count, Kirill Vladimirovich, has fathered
>dozens of illegitimate sons. The
>Bolkonskys are an old established
>and wealthy family based at
>Bald Hills. Old Prince Bolkonsky,
>Nikolai Andreevich, served as a
>general under Catherine the Great,
>in earlier wars. The Moscow
>Rostovs have many estates, but
>never enough cash. They are
>a closely knit, loving family
>who live for the moment
>regardless of their financial situation.
>The Kuragin family has three
>children, who are all of
>questionable character. The Drubetskoy family
>is of impoverished nobility, and
>consists of an elderly mother
>and her only son, Boris,
>whom she wishes to push
>up the career ladder.
>
>Tolstoy spent years researching and rewriting
>the book. He worked from
>primary source materials (interviews and
>other documents), as well as
>from history books, philosophy texts
>and other historical novels.[16] Tolstoy
>also used a great deal
>of his own experience in
>the Crimean War to bring
>vivid detail and first-hand accounts
>of how the Russian army
>was structured.[17]
>
>The standard Russian text of 'War
>and Peace' is divided into
>four books (fifteen parts) and
>two epilogues ? one mainly
>narrative, the other thematic. While
>roughly the first half of
>the novel is concerned strictly
>with the fictional characters, the
>later parts, as well as
>one of the work's two
>epilogues, increasingly consist of essays
>about the nature of war,
>power, history, and historiography. Tolstoy
>interspersed these essays into the
>story in a way that
>defies previous fictional convention. Certain
>abridged versions remove these essays
>entirely, while others, published even
>during Tolstoy's life, simply moved
>these essays into an appendix.
>
>
>[edit] Plot summary
>War and Peace has a huge
>cast of characters, some historically
>real, like Napoleon and Alexander
>I, the majority of whom
>are introduced in the first
>book. The scope of the
>novel is vast, but the
>focus is primarily on five
>aristocratic families and their experiences
>in life. The interactions of
>these characters are set in
>the era leading up to,
>around and following the French
>invasion of Russia during the
>Napoleonic wars.[18]
>
>[edit] Book/Volume One
>The novel begins in Saint Petersburg,
>at a soir?e given in
>July 1805 by Anna Pavlovna
>Scherer ? the maid of
>honour and confidante to the
>queen mother Maria Feodorovna. Many
>of the main players and
>aristocratic families of the novel
>are introduced as they enter
>Anna Pavlovna's salon. Pierre (Pyotr
>Kirilovich) Bezukhov is the illegitimate
>son of a wealthy count,
>an elderly man who is
>dying after a series of
>strokes. He is about to
>become embroiled in a struggle
>for his inheritance. Educated abroad
>after his mother's death and
>at his father's expense, Pierre
>is essentially kindhearted, but socially
>awkward owing in part to
>his open, benevolent nature, and
>finds it difficult to integrate
>into Petersburg society. He is
>his father's favorite of all
>the old count's illegitimate children,
>and this is known to
>everyone at Anna Pavlovna's.
>
>Pierre's friend, the intelligent and sardonic
>Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky, husband
>of the charming society favourite
>Lise, also attends the soire?.
>Finding Petersburg society unctuous and
>disillusioned with married life after
>discovering his wife is empty
>and superficial, Prince Andrei makes
>the fateful choice to be
>an aide-de-camp to Prince Mikhail
>Ilarionovich Kutuzov in the coming
>war against Napoleon.
>
>The plot then moves to Moscow,
>Russia's ancient city and former
>capital, contrasting its provincial, more
>Russian ways to the highly
>mannered society of Petersburg. The
>Rostov family are introduced. Count
>Ilya Andreyevich Rostov has four
>adolescent children. Thirteen-year-old Natasha (Natalia
>Ilyinichna) believes herself in love
>with Boris Drubetskoy, a disciplined
>young man who is about
>to join the army as
>an officer. Twenty-year-old Nikolai Ilyich
>pledges his teenage love to
>Sonya (Sofia Alexandrovna), his fifteen-year-old
>cousin, an orphan who has
>been brought up by the
>Rostovs. The eldest child of
>the Rostov family, Vera Ilyinichna,
>is cold and somewhat haughty
>but has a good prospective
>marriage in a Russian-German officer,
>Adolf Karlovich Berg. Petya (Pyotr
>Ilyich) is nine and the
>youngest of the Rostov family;
>like his brother, he is
>impetuous and eager to join
>the army when of age.
>The heads of the family,
>Count Ilya Rostov and Countess
>Natalya Rostova, are an affectionate
>couple but forever worried about
>their disordered finances.
>
>At Bald Hills, the Bolkonskys' country
>estate, Prince Andrei leaves his
>terrified, pregnant wife Lise with
>his eccentric father Prince Nikolai
>Andreyevich Bolkonsky and his devoutly
>religious sister Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya,
>and departs for the war.
>
>
>The second part opens with descriptions
>of the impending Russian-French war
>preparations. At the Sch?ngrabern engagement,
>Nikolai Rostov, who is now
>conscripted as ensign in a
>squadron of hussars, has his
>first taste of battle. He
>meets Prince Andrei, whom he
>insults in a fit of
>impetuousness. Even more than most
>young soldiers, he is deeply
>attracted by Tsar Alexander's charisma.
>Nikolai gambles and socializes with
>his officer, Vasily Dmitrich Denisov,
>and befriends the ruthless and
>perhaps psychopathic Fyodor Ivanovich Dolokhov.
>
>
>[edit] Book/Volume Two
>Book Two begins with Nikolai Rostov
>briefly returning home to Moscow
>on home leave in early
>1806. Nikolai finds the Rostov
>family facing financial ruin due
>to poor estate management. He
>spends an eventful winter at
>home, accompanied by his friend
>Denisov, his officer from the
>Pavlograd Regiment in which he
>serves. Natasha has blossomed into
>a beautiful young girl. Denisov
>falls in love with her,
>proposes marriage but is rejected.
>Although his mother pleads with
>Nikolai to find himself a
>good financial prospect in marriage,
>Nikolai refuses to accede to
>his mother's request. He promises
>to marry his childhood sweetheart,
>the dowry-less Sonya.
>
>Pierre Bezukhov, upon finally receiving his
>massive inheritance, is suddenly transformed
>from a bumbling young man
>into the richest and most
>eligible bachelor in the Russian
>Empire. Despite rationally knowing that
>it is wrong, he proposes
>marriage with Prince Kuragin's beautiful
>and immoral daughter H?l?ne (Elena
>Vasilyevna Kuragina), to whom he
>is sexually attracted. H?l?ne, who
>is rumoured to be involved
>in an incestuous affair with
>her brother, the equally charming
>and immoral Anatol, tells Pierre
>that she will never have
>children with him. H?l?ne has
>an affair with Dolokhov, who
>mocks Pierre in public. Pierre
>loses his temper and challenges
>Dolokhov, a seasoned dueller and
>a ruthless killer, to a
>duel. Unexpectedly, Pierre wounds Dolokhov.
>H?l?ne denies her affair, but
>Pierre is convinced of her
>guilt and, after almost being
>violent to her, leaves her.
>In his moral and spiritual
>confusion, he joins the Freemasons,
>and becomes embroiled in Masonic
>internal politics. Much of Book
>Two concerns his struggles with
>his passions and his spiritual
>conflicts to be a better
>man. Now a rich aristocrat,
>he abandons his former carefree
>behavior and enters upon a
>philosophical quest particular to Tolstoy:
>how should one live a
>moral life in an ethically
>imperfect world? The question continually
>baffles and confuses Pierre. He
>attempts to liberate his serfs,
>but ultimately achieves nothing of
>note.
>
>Pierre is vividly contrasted with the
>intelligent and ambitious Prince Andrei
>Bolkonsky. At the Battle of
>Austerlitz, Andrei is inspired by
>a vision of glory to
>lead a charge of a
>straggling army. He suffers a
>near fatal artillery wound. In
>the face of death, Andrei
>realizes all his former ambitions
>are pointless and his former
>hero Napoleon (who rescues him
>in a horseback excursion to
>the battlefield) is apparently as
>vain as himself.
>
>Prince Andrei recovers from his injuries
>in a military hospital and
>returns home, only to find
>his wife Lise dying in
>childbirth. He is stricken by
>his guilty conscience for not
>treating Lise better when she
>was alive and is haunted
>by the pitiful expression on
>his dead wife's face. His
>child, Nikolenka, survives.
>
>Burdened with nihilistic disillusionment, Prince Andrei
>does not return to the
>army but chooses to remain
>on his estate, working on
>a project that would codify
>military behavior and help solve
>some of the problems of
>Russian disorganization that he believes
>were responsible for the loss
>of life in battle on
>the Russian side. Pierre comes
>to visit him and brings
>new questions: where is God
>in this amoral world? Pierre
>is interested in panentheism and
>the possibility of an afterlife.
>
>
>Pierre's estranged wife, H?l?ne, begs him
>to take her back, and
>against his better judgment he
>does. Despite her vapid shallowness,
>H?l?ne establishes herself as an
>influential hostess in Petersburg society.
>
>
>Prince Andrei feels impelled to take
>his newly written military notions
>to Petersburg, naively expecting to
>influence either the Emperor himself
>or those close to him.
>Young Natasha, also in Petersburg,
>is caught up in the
>excitement of dressing for her
>first grand ball, where she
>meets Prince Andrei and briefly
>reinvigorates him with her vivacious
>charm. Andrei believes he has
>found purpose in life again
>and, after paying the Rostovs
>several visits, proposes marriage to
>Natasha. However, old Prince Bolkonsky,
>Andrei's father, dislikes the Rostovs,
>opposes the marriage, and insists
>on a year's delay. Prince
>Andrei leaves to recuperate from
>his wounds abroad, leaving Natasha
>initially distraught. She soon recovers
>her spirits, however, and Count
>Rostov takes her and Sonya
>to spend some time with
>a friend in Moscow.
>
>Natasha visits the Moscow opera, where
>she meets H?l?ne and her
>brother Anatol. Anatol has since
>married a Polish woman whom
>he has abandoned in Poland.
>He is very attracted to
>Natasha and is determined to
>seduce her. H?l?ne and Anatol
>conspire together to accomplish this
>plan. Anatol kisses Natasha and
>writes her passionate letters, eventually
>establishing plans to elope. Natasha
>is convinced that she loves
>Anatol and writes to Princess
>Maria, Andrei's sister, breaking off
>her engagement. At the last
>moment, Sonya discovers her plans
>to elope and foils them.
>Pierre is initially shocked and
>horrified at Natasha's behavior, but
>comes to realize he has
>fallen in love with her
>himself. During the time when
>the Great Comet of 1811?2
>streaks the sky, life appears
>to begin anew for Pierre.
>
>
>Prince Andrei accepts coldly Natasha's breaking
>of the engagement. He tells
>Pierre that his pride will
>not allow him to renew
>his proposal of marriage. Shamed
>by her near-seduction and at
>the realisation that Andrei will
>not forgive her, Natasha makes
>a suicide attempt and is
>left seriously ill.
>
>[edit] Book/Volume Three
>With the help of her family,
>especially Sonya, and the stirrings
>of religious faith, Natasha manages
>to persevere in Moscow through
>this dark period. Meanwhile, the
>whole of Russia is affected
>by the coming showdown between
>Napoleon's troops and the Russian
>army. Pierre convinces himself through
>gematria that Napoleon is the
>Antichrist of the Book of
>Revelation. Old prince Bolkonsky dies
>of a stroke while trying
>to protect his estate from
>French marauders. No organized help
>from any Russian army seems
>available to the Bolkonskys, but
>Nikolai Rostov turns up at
>their estate in time to
>help put down an incipient
>peasant revolt. He finds himself
>attracted to Princess Maria, but
>remembers his promise to Sonya.
>
>
>Back in Moscow, the war-obsessed Petya
>manages to snatch a loose
>piece of the Tsar's biscuit
>outside the Cathedral of the
>Assumption; he finally convinces his
>parents to allow him to
>enlist.
>
>Napoleon himself is a main character
>in this section of the
>novel and is presented in
>vivid detail, as both thinker
>and would-be strategist. His toilette
>and his customary attitudes and
>traits of mind are depicted
>in detail. Also described are
>the well-organized force of over
>400,000 French Army (only 140,000
>of them actually French-speaking) which
>marches quickly through the Russian
>countryside in the late summer
>and reaches the outskirts of
>the city of Smolensk. Pierre
>decides to leave Moscow and
>go to watch the Battle
>of Borodino from a vantage
>point next to a Russian
>artillery crew. After watching for
>a time, he begins to
>join in carrying ammunition. In
>the midst of the turmoil
>he experiences firsthand the death
>and destruction of war. The
>battle becomes a hideous slaughter
>for both armies and ends
>in a standoff. The Russians,
>however, have won a moral
>victory by standing up to
>Napoleon's reputedly invincible army. For
>strategic reasons and having suffered
>grievous losses, the Russian army
>withdraws the next day, allowing
>Napoleon to march on to
>Moscow. Among the casualties are
>Anatol Kuragin and Prince Andrei.
>Anatol loses a leg, and
>Andrei suffers a cannon wound
>in the abdomen. Both are
>reported dead, but their families
>are in such disarray that
>no one can be notified.
>
>
>[edit] Book/Volume Four
>The Rostovs have waited until the
>last minute to abandon Moscow,
>even after it is clear
>that Kutuzov has retreated past
>Moscow and Muscovites are being
>given contradictory, often propagandistic, instructions
>on how to either flee
>or fight. Count Rostopchin is
>publishing posters, rousing the citizens
>to put their faith in
>religious icons, while at the
>same time urging them to
>fight with pitchforks if necessary.
>Before fleeing himself, he gives
>orders to burn the city.
>The Rostovs have a difficult
>time deciding what to take
>with them, and in the
>end load their carts with
>the wounded and dying from
>the Battle of Borodino. Unknown
>to Natasha, Prince Andrei is
>amongst the wounded.
>
>When Napoleon's Grand Army finally occupies
>an abandoned and burning Moscow,
>Pierre takes off on a
>quixotic mission to assassinate Napoleon.
>He becomes an anonymous man
>in all the chaos, shedding
>his responsibilities by wearing peasant
>clothes and shunning his duties
>and lifestyle. The only people
>he sees while in this
>garb are Natasha and some
>of her family, as they
>depart Moscow. Natasha recognizes and
>smiles at him, and he
>in turn realizes the full
>scope of his love for
>her.
>
>Pierre saves the life of a
>French officer who fought at
>Borodino, yet is taken prisoner
>by the retreating French after
>his attempted assassination of Napoleon.
>He becomes friends with a
>fellow prisoner, Platon Karataev, a
>peasant with a saintly demeanor,
>who is incapable of malice.
>In Karataev, Pierre finally finds
>what he has been seeking:
>an honest person of integrity
>(unlike the aristocrats of Petersburg
>society) who is utterly without
>pretense. Pierre discovers meaning in
>life simply by living and
>interacting with him. After witnessing
>French soldiers sacking Moscow and
>shooting Russian civilians arbitrarily, Pierre
>is forced to march with
>the Grand Army during its
>disastrous retreat from Moscow in
>the harsh Russian winter. After
>months of trial and tribulation?during
>which the fever-plagued Karataev is
>shot by the French?Pierre is
>finally freed by a Russian
>raiding party, after a small
>skirmish with the French that
>sees the young Petya Rostov
>killed in action.
>
>Meanwhile, Andrei, wounded during Napoleon's invasion,
>has been taken in as
>a casualty and cared for
>by the fleeing Rostovs. He
>is reunited with Natasha and
>his sister Maria before the
>end of the war. Having
>lost all will to live,
>he forgives Natasha in a
>last act before dying.
>
>As the novel draws to a
>close, Pierre's wife H?l?ne dies
>in a botched operation (implied
>to be an abortion). Pierre
>is reunited with Natasha, while
>the victorious Russians rebuild Moscow.
>Natasha speaks of Prince Andrei's
>death and Pierre of Karataev's.
>Both are aware of a
>growing bond between them in
>their bereavement. With the help
>of Princess Maria, Pierre finds
>love at last and, revealing
>his love after being released
>by his former wife's death,
>marries Natasha.
>
>[edit] Epilogues
>The first epilogue begins with the
>wedding of Pierre and Natasha
>in 1813. It is the
>last happy event for the
>Rostov family, which is undergoing
>a transition. Count Rostov dies
>soon after, leaving his eldest
>son Nikolai to take charge
>of the debt-ridden estate.
>
>Nikolai finds himself with the task
>of maintaining the family on
>the verge of bankruptcy. His
>abhorrence at the idea of
>marrying for wealth almost gets
>in his way, but finally
>in spite of rather than
>according to his mother's wishes,
>he marries the now-rich Maria
>Bolkonskaya and in so doing
>also saves his family from
>financial ruin.
>
>Nikolai and Maria then move to
>Bald Hills with his mother
>and Sonya, whom he supports
>for the rest of their
>life. Buoyed by his wife's
>fortune, Nikolai pays off all
>his family's debts. They also
>raise Prince Andrei's orphaned son,
>Nikolai Andreyevich (Nikolenka) Bolkonsky.
>
>As in all good marriages, there
>are misunderstandings, but the couples?Pierre
>and Natasha, Nikolai and Maria?remain
>devoted to their spouses. Pierre
>and Natasha visit Bald Hills
>in 1820, much to the
>jubilation of everyone concerned. There
>is a hint in the
>closing chapters that the idealistic,
>boyish Nikolenka and Pierre would
>both become part of the
>Decembrist Uprising. The first epilogue
>concludes with Nikolenka promising he
>would do something with which
>even his late father "would
>be satisfied..." (presumably as a
>revolutionary in the Decembrist revolt).
>
>
>The second epilogue contains Tolstoy's critique
>of all existing forms of
>mainstream history. He attempts to
>show that there is a
>great force behind history, which
>he first terms divine. He
>offers the entire book as
>evidence of this force, and
>critiques his own work. God,
>therefore, becomes the word Tolstoy
>uses to refer to all
>the forces that produce history,
>taken together and operating behind
>the scenes.
>
>[edit] Principal characters in War and
>Peace
>Main article: List of characters in
>War and Peace
>
>War and Peace character treeCount Pyotr
>Kirillovich (Pierre) Bezukhov ? The
>central character and often a
>voice for Tolstoy's own beliefs
>or struggles. He is one
>of several illegitimate children of
>Count Bezukhov; he is his
>father's favorite offspring.
>Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky ? A
>strong but cynical, thoughtful and
>philosophical aide-de-camp in the Napoleonic
>Wars.
>Princess Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya ? A
>pious woman whose eccentric father
>attempted to give her a
>good education. The caring, nurturing
>nature of her large eyes
>in her otherwise thin and
>plain face are frequently mentioned.
>
>Count Ilya Andreyevich Rostov ? The
>pater-familias of the Rostov family;
>terrible with finances, generous to
>a fault.
>Countess Natalya Rostova ? Wife of
>Count Ilya Rostov, mother of
>the four Rostov children.
>Countess Natalia Ilyinichna (Natasha) Rostova ?
>Introduced as a beautiful and
>romantic young girl, she evolves
>through trials and suffering and
>eventually finds happiness. She is
>an accomplished singer and dancer.[citation
>needed]
>Count Nikolai Ilyich Rostov ? A
>hussar, the beloved eldest son
>of the Rostov family.
>Sofia Alexandrovna (Sonya) Rostova ? Orphaned
>cousin of Vera, Nikolai, Natasha
>and Petya Rostov.
>Countess Vera Ilyinichna Rostova ? Eldest
>of the Rostov children, she
>marries the German career soldier,
>Berg.
>Pyotr Ilyich (Petya) Rostov ? Youngest
>of the Rostov children.
>Prince Vasily Sergeyevich Kuragin ? A
>ruthless man who is determined
>to marry his children well,
>despite having doubts about the
>character of some of them.
>
>Princess Elena Vasilyevna (H?l?ne) Kuragina ?
>A beautiful and sexually alluring
>woman who has many affairs,
>including (it is rumoured) with
>her brother Anatole
>Prince Anatol Vasilyevich Kuragin ? H?l?ne's
>brother and a very handsome,
>ruthless and amoral pleasure seeker
>who is secretly married yet
>tries to elope with Natasha
>Rostova.
>Prince Ipolit Vasilyevich ? The eldest
>and perhaps most dim-witted of
>the Kuragin children.
>Prince Boris Drubetskoy ? A poor
>but aristocratic young man who
>is determined to make his
>career, even at the expense
>of his friends and benefactors,
>marries a rich and ugly
>woman to help him climb
>the social ladder.
>Princess Anna Mikhailovna Drubetskoya ? The
>mother of Boris.
>Fyodor Ivanovich Dolokhov ? A cold,
>almost psychopathic officer, he ruins
>Nikolai Rostov after his proposal
>to Sonya is refused, he
>only shows love to his
>doting mother.
>Adolf Karlovich Berg ? A young
>Russian officer, who desires to
>be just like everyone else.
>
>Anna Pavlovna Sherer ? Also known
>as Annette, she is the
>hostess of the salon that
>is the site of much
>of the novel's action in
>Petersburg.
>Maria Dmitryevna Akhrosimova ? An older
>Moscow society lady, she is
>an elegant dancer and trend-setter,
>despite her age and size.
>
>Amalia Evgenyevna Bourienne ? A French
>woman who lives with the
>Bolkonskys, primarily as Princess Marya's
>companion.
>Vasily Dmitrich Denisov ? Nikolai Rostov's
>friend and brother officer, who
>proposes to Natasha.
>Platon Krataev - The archetypal good
>Russian peasant, whom Pierre meets
>in the prisoner of war
>camp.
>Napoleon I of France ? the
>Great Man, whose fate is
>detailed in the book.
>General Mikhail Ilarionovich Kutuzov ? Russian
>commander-in-chief throughout the book. His
>diligence and modesty eventually save
>Russia from Napoleon.[citation needed]
>Osip Bazdeyev ? the Freemason who
>interests Pierre in his mysterious
>group, starting a lengthy subplot.[citation
>needed]
>Tsar Alexander I of Russia ?
>He signed a peace treaty
>with Napoleon in 1807 and
>then went to war with
>him.
>Many of Tolstoy's characters in War
>and Peace were based on
>real-life people known to Tolstoy
>himself. His grandparents and their
>friends were the models for
>many of the main characters,
>his great-grandparents would have been
>of the generation of Prince
>Vasilly or Count Ilya Rostov.
>Some of the characters, obviously,
>are actual historic figures.
>
>[edit] Adaptations
>[edit] Film
>The first Russian film adaptation of
>War and Peace was the
>1915 film Война и мир
>(Voyna i mir), directed by
>Vladimir Gardin and starring Gardin
>and the Russian ballerina Vera
>Karalli. It was followed in
>1968 by the critically acclaimed
>four-part film version War and
>Peace, by the Soviet director
>Sergei Bondarchuk, released individually in
>1965-1967, and as a re-edited
>whole in 1968. This starred
>Lyudmila Savelyeva (as Natasha Rostova)
>and Vyacheslav Tikhonov (as Andrei
>Bolkonsky). Bondarchuk himself played the
>character of Pierre Bezukhov. The
>film was almost seven hours
>long; it involved thousands of
>actors, 120 000 extras, and
>it took seven years to
>finish the shooting, as a
>result of which the actors
>age changed dramatically from scene
>to scene. It won an
>Oscar for Best Foreign Language
>Film for its authenticity and
>massive scale. [2]
>
>The novel has been adapted twice
>for cinema outside of Russia.
>The first of these was
>produced by F. Kamei in
>Japan (1947). The second was
>the 208-minute long 1956 War
>and Peace, directed by the
>American King Vidor. This starred
>Audrey Hepburn (Natasha), Henry Fonda
>(Pierre) and Mel Ferrer (Andrei).
>Audrey Hepburn was nominated for
>a BAFTA Award for best
>British actress and for a
>Golden Globe Award for best
>actress in a drama production.
>
>
>[edit] Opera
>Initiated by a proposal of the
>German director Erwin Piscator in
>1938, the Russian composer Sergei
>Prokofiev composed his opera War
>and Peace based on this
>epic novel during the 1940s.
>The complete musical work premiered
>in Leningrad in 1955. It
>was the first opera to
>be given a public performance
>at the Sydney Opera House
>(1973).[19]
>[edit] Music
>War and Peace (Op. 91) (Russian:
>Война и мир, Voyna i
>mir) is an opera by
>Sergei Prokofiev, with a libretto
>by Mira Mendelson, and is
>based on the novel.
>Composition by Nino Rota [3]
>Referring to album notes on http://www.yesworld.com/,
>the first track "The Gates
>of Delirium", from the album
>Relayer, by the progressive rock
>group Yes, is said to
>be based loosely on the
>novel.
>[edit] Theatre
>The first successful stage adaptations of
>War and Peace were produced
>by Alfred Neumann and Erwin
>Piscator (1942, revised 1955, published
>by Macgibbon & Kee in
>London 1963, and staged in
>16 countries since) and R.
>Lucas (1943).
>
>A stage adaptation by Helen Edmundson,
>first produced in 1996 at
>the Royal National Theatre, was
>published that year by Nick
>Hern Books, London. Edmundson added
>to and amended the play[4]
>for a 2008 production as
>two 3-hour parts by Shared
>Experience, directed by Nancy Meckler
>and Polly Teale.[5] This was
>first put on at the
>Nottingham Playhouse, then toured in
>the UK to Liverpool, Darlington,
>Bath, Warwick, Oxford, Truro, London
>(the Hampstead Theatre) and Cheltenham.
>
>
>On the 15th-18th july, The Birmingham
>Theatre School performed this 7
>hour epic play at The
>Crescent Theatre in Brindleyplace with
>great success. Birmingham Theatre School
>is the only drama school
>in the world to perform
>the new adaptation of War
>and Peace. Directed by Chris
>Rozanski and Assistant to Director
>was Royal National Theatre performer
>Anthony Mark Barrow with Vocals
>arranged by Dr Ria Keen
>and choreography by Colin Lang.
>
>
>[edit] Radio and television
>In December 1970, Pacifica Radio station
>WBAI broadcast a reading of
>the entire novel (the 1968
>Dunnigan translation) read by over
>140 celebrities and ordinary people.
>[6]
>War and Peace (1972): The BBC
>(British Broadcasting Corporation) made a
>television serial based on the
>novel, broadcast in 1972-73. Anthony
>Hopkins played the lead role
>of Pierre. Other lead characters
>were played by Rupert Davies,
>Faith Brook, Morag Hood, Alan
>Dobie, Angela Down and Sylvester
>Morand. This version faithfully included
>many of Tolstoy's minor characters,
>including Platon Karataev (Harry Locke).
>[7], [8]
>A dramatized full-cast adaptation in ten
>parts was written by Marcy
>Kahan and Mike Walker in
>1997. The production won the
>1998 Talkie award for Best
>Drama and was around 9.5
>hours in length. It was
>directed by Janet Whitaker and
>featured Simon Russell Beale, Gerard
>Murphy, Richard Johnson, and others.[20]
>
>La Guerre et la paix (TV)
>(2000) by Fran?ois Roussillon. Robert
>Brubaker played the lead role
>of Pierre.[9]
>War and Peace (2007): produced by
>the Italian Lux Vide, a
>TV mini-series in Russian &
>English co-produced in Russia, France,
>Germany, Poland and Italy. Directed
>by Robert Dornhelm, with screenplay
>written by Lorenzo Favella, Enrico
>Medioli and Gavin Scott. It
>features an international cast with
>Alexander Beyer playing the lead
>role of Pierre assisted by
>Malcolm McDowell, Cl?mence Po?sy, Alessio
>Boni, Pilar Abella, J. Kimo
>Arbas, Ken Duken, Juozapas Bagdonas
>and Toni Bertorelli.[10]
>[edit] Full translations into English
>Clara Bell (from a French version)
>1885-86
>W. H. Dole 1889
>Leo Wiener 1904
>Constance Garnett (1904)
>Louise and Aylmer Maude (1922-3)
>Rosemary Edmonds (1957, revised 1978)
>Ann Dunnigan (1968)
>Anthony Briggs (2005)
>Andrew Bromfield (2007), translation of the
>first completed draft, approx. 400
>pages shorter than other English
>translations.[3]
>Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (2007)
>
>[edit] See also
>List of characters in War and
>Peace
>List of historical novels
>Natasha's Dance by Orlando Figes, a
>cultural history of Russia using
>the name of the main
>female character [11]
>[edit] References
>^ Moser, Charles. 1992. Encyclopedia of
>Russian Literature. Cambridge University Press.
>Pp. 298?300.; Thirwell, Adam. 2005.
>"A masterpiece in miniature." London:
>Guardian UK, October 8; Briggs,
>Anthony. 2005. "Introduction" to War
>and Peace. Penguin Classics.
>^ Knowles, A.V. Leo Tolstoy, Routledge
>1997.
>^ Newsweek's Top 100 Books: The
>Meta-List, retrieved on 07 July
>2009
>^ "Introduction?". War and Peace. Wordsworth
>Editions. 1993. http://books.google.com/books?id=c4...mcH3Cw&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=3&ct=result. Retrieved 2009-03-24.
>
>^ Feuer, Kathryn.
>^ Emerson, Caryl. 1985. "The Tolstoy
>Connection in Bakhtin", in PMLA,
>Vol 100, No 1, pp.
>69-71. Modern Language Association.
>^ Emerson, Caryl. 1985. Ibid, p.
>68-69
>^ Feuer, Kathryn B. 1996
>^ Pearson and Volokhonsky op cit.
>
>^ cf. Knowles 1997, Feuer 1996
>
>^ Feuer 1996
>^ "Introduction to War and Peace"
>by Richard Peaver in Peaver,
>Richard and Larissa Volokhonsky, War
>and Peace, 2008, Vintage Classics.
>
>^ Greenwood, Edward Baker (1980). "What
>is War and Peace?". Tolstoy:
>The Comprehensive Vision. London: Taylor
>& Francis. p. 83. ISBN
>0416741304. http://books.google.com/books?id=ta...tcover&hl=ru&source=gbs_summary_r&cad&pg=PA83.
>^ Figes, O, Tolstoy's Real Hero.
>NYRB 22 Nov 2007,pp 4-7.
>
>^ a b Figes O (November
>22, 2007). "Tolstoy?s Real Hero".
>The New York Review of
>Books, Volume 54, Number 18.
>
>^ Feuer, Kathryn B. Tolstoy and
>the Genesis of War and
>Peace, Cornell University Press, 1996
>(First Edition)
>^ Troyat, Henri. Tolstoy, a biography.
>Doubleday, 1967.
>^ [1]
>^ Sydney Opera House: History -
>highlights
>^ "Marcy Kahan Radio Plays". War
>And Peace (Radio Dramatization). http://web.ukonline.co.uk/suttonelms/mkahan.html.
>Retrieved 2010-01-20.
>[edit] External links
> Wikisource has original text related
>to this article:
>War and Peace
>English translation at gutenberg
>Searchable version of the gutenberg text
>in multiple formats SiSU
>War and Peace, complete text with
>accompanying audio.
>Full text of War and Peace
>in modern Russian orthography
>An audio version of Book 1
>of War and Peace (other
>books are available through links).
>
>A searchable online version of Aylmer
>Maude's English translation of War
>and Peace
>SparkNotes Study Guide for "War and
>Peace"
>Birth, death, balls and battles by
>Orlando Figes. This is an
>edited version of an essay
>found in the Penguin Classics
>new translation of War and
>Peace (2005).
>Homage to War and Peace Searchable
>map, compiled by Nicholas Jenkins,
>of places named in Tolstoy's
>novel (2008).
>Russian Army during the Napoleonic Wars
>
>The War and Peace Broadcast: 35th
>Anniversary, from Pacifica Radio Archives
>site
>War and Peace at the Internet
>Book List
>Radio documentary about 1970 marathon reading
>of War and Peace on
>WBAI, from Democracy Now! program,
>December 6, 2005
>Disscusion-Forum at Reading Group Guides

Thanks Nv......Ha!

Robb
 
>>
>>I may just use this as
>>my signature

>>
>>
>>
>>
>>War and Peace (Russian: Война и
>>мир, Voyn? i mir), a
>>Russian novel by Leo Tolstoy,
>>is considered one of the
>>world's greatest works of fiction.[1]
>>It is regarded, along with
>>Anna Karenina (1873?1877), as his
>>finest literary achievement.
>>
>>Epic in scale, War and Peace
>>delineates in graphic detail events
>>leading up to Napoleon's invasion
>>of Russia, and the impact
>>of the Napoleonic era on
>>Tsarist society, as seen through
>>the eyes of five Russian
>>aristocratic families.
>>
>>Portions of an earlier version having
>>been serialized in the magazine
>>The Russian Messenger between 1865
>>and 1867, the novel was
>>first published in its entirety
>>in 1869.[2] Newsweek in 2009
>>ranked it top of its
>>list of Top 100 Books.[3]
>>
>>
>>Tolstoy himself, somewhat enigmatically, said of
>>War and Peace that it
>>was "not a novel, even
>>less is it a poem,
>>and still less an historical
>>chronicle."[4]
>>
>>Contents [hide]
>>1 Crafting the novel
>>1.1 Realism
>>2 Reception
>>3 Language
>>3.1 English translations
>>4 Background and historical context
>>5 Plot summary
>>5.1 Book/Volume One
>>5.2 Book/Volume Two
>>5.3 Book/Volume Three
>>5.4 Book/Volume Four
>>5.5 Epilogues
>>6 Principal characters in War and
>>Peace
>>7 Adaptations
>>7.1 Film
>>7.2 Opera
>>7.3 Music
>>7.4 Theatre
>>7.5 Radio and television
>>7.6 Full translations into English
>>8 See also
>>9 References
>>10 External links
>>
>>
>>[edit] Crafting the novel
>>
>>An undated photograph of Leo Tolstoy
>>dressed for the Russian weatherWar
>>and Peace is famously long
>>for a novel (though not
>>the longest by any means).
>>It is subdivided into four
>>books or volumes, each with
>>subparts containing many chapters.
>>
>>Tolstoy got the title, and some
>>of his themes, from an
>>1861 work of Proudhon: La
>>Guerre et la Paix. Tolstoy
>>had served in the Crimean
>>War and written a series
>>of short stories and novellas
>>featuring scenes of war. He
>>began writing War and Peace
>>in the year that he
>>finally married and settled down
>>at his country estate. During
>>the writing of the second
>>half of the book, after
>>the first half had already
>>been written under the name
>>"1805", he read widely, acknowledging
>>Schopenhauer as one of his
>>main inspirations, although he developed
>>his own views of history
>>and the role of the
>>individual within it.[5]
>>
>>The novel can be generally classified
>>as historical fiction. It contains
>>elements present in many types
>>of popular 18th and 19th
>>century literature, especially the romance
>>novel. War and Peace attains
>>its literary status by transcending
>>genres. Tolstoy was instrumental in
>>bringing a new kind of
>>consciousness to the novel. His
>>narrative structure is noted for
>>its "god-like" ability to hover
>>over and within events, but
>>also swiftly and seamlessly to
>>take a particular character's point
>>of view.[6] His use of
>>visual detail is often cinematic
>>in its scope, using the
>>literary equivalents of panning, wide
>>shots and close-ups, to give
>>dramatic interest to battles and
>>ballrooms alike. These devices, while
>>not exclusive to Tolstoy, are
>>part of the new novel
>>that is arising in the
>>mid-19th century and of which
>>Tolstoy proves himself a master.[7]
>>
>>
>>[edit] Realism
>>Tolstoy incorporated extensive historical research, and
>>he was influenced by many
>>other novels as well.[8] Himself
>>a veteran of the Crimean
>>War, Tolstoy was quite critical
>>of standard history, especially the
>>standards of military history, in
>>War and Peace. Tolstoy read
>>all the standard histories available
>>in Russian and French about
>>the Napoleonic Wars and combined
>>more traditional historical writing with
>>the novel form - he
>>explains at the start of
>>the novel's third volume his
>>views on how history ought
>>to be written. His aim
>>was to blur the line
>>between fiction and history, in
>>order to get closer to
>>the truth, as he states
>>in Volume II.
>>
>>The novel is set 60 years
>>earlier than the time at
>>which Tolstoy wrote it, "in
>>the days of our grandfathers",
>>as he puts it. He
>>had spoken with people who
>>had lived through the war
>>of 1812 (In Russia), so
>>the book is also, in
>>part, accurate ethnography fictionalized. He
>>read letters, journals, autobiographical and
>>biographical materials pertaining to Napoleon
>>and the dozens of other
>>historical characters in the novel.
>>There are approximately 160 real
>>persons named or referred to
>>in War and Peace.[9]
>>
>>[edit] Reception
>>The first draft of War and
>>Peace was completed in 1863.
>>In 1865, the periodical Russkiy
>>Vestnik published the first part
>>of this early version under
>>the title 1805 and the
>>following year published more of
>>the same early version. Tolstoy
>>was increasingly dissatisfied with this
>>version, although he allowed several
>>parts of it to be
>>published (with a different ending)
>>in 1867 still under the
>>title "1805" He heavily rewrote
>>the entire novel between 1866
>>and 1869.[10] Tolstoy's wife Sophia
>>Tolstoy handwrote as many as
>>8 or 9 separate complete
>>manuscripts before Tolstoy considered it
>>again ready for publication.[11] The
>>version that was published in
>>Russkiy Vestnik had a very
>>different ending than the version
>>eventually published under the title
>>War and Peace in 1869.
>>
>>
>>The completed novel was then called
>>Voyna i mir (new style
>>orthography; in English War and
>>Peace).
>>
>>Tolstoy did not destroy the 1805
>>manuscript (sometimes referred to as
>>"the original War and Peace"),
>>which was re-edited and annotated
>>in Russia in 1983 and
>>since has been translated separately
>>from the "known" version, to
>>English, German, French, Spanish, Dutch,
>>Swedish, Finnish and Korean. The
>>fact that so many extant
>>versions of War and Peace
>>survive make it one of
>>the best revelations into the
>>mental processes of a great
>>novelist.
>>
>>Russians who had read the serialized
>>version, were anxious to acquire
>>the complete first edition, which
>>included epilogues, and it sold
>>out almost immediately. The novel
>>was translated almost immediately after
>>publication into many other languages.
>>
>>
>>Isaac Babel said, after reading War
>>and Peace, "If the world
>>could write by itself, it
>>would write like Tolstoy."[12] Tolstoy
>>"gives us a unique combination
>>of the 'naive objectivity' of
>>the oral narrator with the
>>interest in detail characteristic of
>>realism. This is the reason
>>for our trust in his
>>presentation."[13]
>>
>>[edit] Language
>>Although Tolstoy wrote most of the
>>book, including all the narration,
>>in Russian, significant portions of
>>dialogue (including its opening paragraph)
>>are written in French and
>>characters often switch between the
>>languages. This reflected 19th century
>>reality since Russian aristocracy in
>>the early nineteenth century were
>>conversant in French, which was
>>often considered more refined than
>>Russian?many were much less competent
>>in Russian. An example in
>>the novel is Julie Karagina,
>>Princess Marya's friend, who has
>>to take Russian lessons in
>>order to master her native
>>language.
>>
>>It has been suggested[14] that it
>>is a deliberate strategy of
>>Tolstoy to use French to
>>portray artifice and insincerity, as
>>the language of the theater
>>and deceit while Russian emerges
>>as a language of sincerity,
>>honesty and seriousness. When Pierre
>>proposes to Helene he speaks
>>to her in French?Je vous
>>aime?and as the marriage emerges
>>as a sham he blames
>>those words.
>>
>>As the book progresses, and the
>>wars with the French intensify,
>>culminating in the capture and
>>eventual burning of Moscow, the
>>use of French diminishes. The
>>progressive elimination of French from
>>the text is a means
>>of demonstrating that Russia has
>>freed itself from foreign cultural
>>domination. It is also, at
>>the level of plot development,
>>a way of showing that
>>a once-admired and friendly nation,
>>France, has turned into an
>>enemy. By midway through the
>>book, several of the Russian
>>aristocracy, whose command of French
>>is far better than their
>>command of Russian, are anxious
>>to find Russian tutors for
>>themselves.
>>
>>[edit] English translations
>>War and Peace has been translated
>>into English on several occasions,
>>starting by Clara Bell working
>>from a French translation. The
>>translators Constance Garnett and Louise
>>and Aylmer Maude knew Tolstoy
>>personally. Translations have to deal
>>with Tolstoy?s often peculiar syntax
>>and his fondness of repetitions.
>>About 2% of War and
>>Peace is in French; Tolstoy
>>removed the French in a
>>revised 1873 edition, only to
>>restore it later again.[15] Most
>>translators follow Garnett retaining some
>>French, Briggs uses no French,
>>while Pevear-Volokhonsky retain the French
>>fully.[15] (For a list of
>>translations see below)
>>
>>[edit] Background and historical context
>>
>>In 1812 by the Russian artist
>>Illarion PryanishnikovThe novel begins in
>>the year 1805 and leads
>>up to the war of
>>1812[citation needed]. The era of
>>Catherine the Great is still
>>fresh in the minds of
>>older people. It was Catherine
>>who ordered the Russian court
>>to change to speaking French,
>>a custom that was stronger
>>in Petersburg than in Moscow.[citation
>>needed] Catherine's son and successor,
>>Paul I, is the father
>>of the current Czar, Alexander
>>I. Alexander I came to
>>the throne in 1801 at
>>the age of 24. His
>>mother, Marya Feodorovna, is the
>>most powerful woman in the
>>court.
>>
>>The novel tells the story of
>>five aristocratic families ? the
>>Bezukhovs, the Bolkonskys, the Rostovs,
>>the Kuragins and the Drubetskoys?and
>>the entanglements of their personal
>>lives with the history of
>>1805?1813, principally Napoleon's invasion of
>>Russia in 1812. The Bezukhovs,
>>while very rich, are a
>>fragmented family as the old
>>Count, Kirill Vladimirovich, has fathered
>>dozens of illegitimate sons. The
>>Bolkonskys are an old established
>>and wealthy family based at
>>Bald Hills. Old Prince Bolkonsky,
>>Nikolai Andreevich, served as a
>>general under Catherine the Great,
>>in earlier wars. The Moscow
>>Rostovs have many estates, but
>>never enough cash. They are
>>a closely knit, loving family
>>who live for the moment
>>regardless of their financial situation.
>>The Kuragin family has three
>>children, who are all of
>>questionable character. The Drubetskoy family
>>is of impoverished nobility, and
>>consists of an elderly mother
>>and her only son, Boris,
>>whom she wishes to push
>>up the career ladder.
>>
>>Tolstoy spent years researching and rewriting
>>the book. He worked from
>>primary source materials (interviews and
>>other documents), as well as
>>from history books, philosophy texts
>>and other historical novels.[16] Tolstoy
>>also used a great deal
>>of his own experience in
>>the Crimean War to bring
>>vivid detail and first-hand accounts
>>of how the Russian army
>>was structured.[17]
>>
>>The standard Russian text of 'War
>>and Peace' is divided into
>>four books (fifteen parts) and
>>two epilogues ? one mainly
>>narrative, the other thematic. While
>>roughly the first half of
>>the novel is concerned strictly
>>with the fictional characters, the
>>later parts, as well as
>>one of the work's two
>>epilogues, increasingly consist of essays
>>about the nature of war,
>>power, history, and historiography. Tolstoy
>>interspersed these essays into the
>>story in a way that
>>defies previous fictional convention. Certain
>>abridged versions remove these essays
>>entirely, while others, published even
>>during Tolstoy's life, simply moved
>>these essays into an appendix.
>>
>>
>>[edit] Plot summary
>>War and Peace has a huge
>>cast of characters, some historically
>>real, like Napoleon and Alexander
>>I, the majority of whom
>>are introduced in the first
>>book. The scope of the
>>novel is vast, but the
>>focus is primarily on five
>>aristocratic families and their experiences
>>in life. The interactions of
>>these characters are set in
>>the era leading up to,
>>around and following the French
>>invasion of Russia during the
>>Napoleonic wars.[18]
>>
>>[edit] Book/Volume One
>>The novel begins in Saint Petersburg,
>>at a soir?e given in
>>July 1805 by Anna Pavlovna
>>Scherer ? the maid of
>>honour and confidante to the
>>queen mother Maria Feodorovna. Many
>>of the main players and
>>aristocratic families of the novel
>>are introduced as they enter
>>Anna Pavlovna's salon. Pierre (Pyotr
>>Kirilovich) Bezukhov is the illegitimate
>>son of a wealthy count,
>>an elderly man who is
>>dying after a series of
>>strokes. He is about to
>>become embroiled in a struggle
>>for his inheritance. Educated abroad
>>after his mother's death and
>>at his father's expense, Pierre
>>is essentially kindhearted, but socially
>>awkward owing in part to
>>his open, benevolent nature, and
>>finds it difficult to integrate
>>into Petersburg society. He is
>>his father's favorite of all
>>the old count's illegitimate children,
>>and this is known to
>>everyone at Anna Pavlovna's.
>>
>>Pierre's friend, the intelligent and sardonic
>>Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky, husband
>>of the charming society favourite
>>Lise, also attends the soire?.
>>Finding Petersburg society unctuous and
>>disillusioned with married life after
>>discovering his wife is empty
>>and superficial, Prince Andrei makes
>>the fateful choice to be
>>an aide-de-camp to Prince Mikhail
>>Ilarionovich Kutuzov in the coming
>>war against Napoleon.
>>
>>The plot then moves to Moscow,
>>Russia's ancient city and former
>>capital, contrasting its provincial, more
>>Russian ways to the highly
>>mannered society of Petersburg. The
>>Rostov family are introduced. Count
>>Ilya Andreyevich Rostov has four
>>adolescent children. Thirteen-year-old Natasha (Natalia
>>Ilyinichna) believes herself in love
>>with Boris Drubetskoy, a disciplined
>>young man who is about
>>to join the army as
>>an officer. Twenty-year-old Nikolai Ilyich
>>pledges his teenage love to
>>Sonya (Sofia Alexandrovna), his fifteen-year-old
>>cousin, an orphan who has
>>been brought up by the
>>Rostovs. The eldest child of
>>the Rostov family, Vera Ilyinichna,
>>is cold and somewhat haughty
>>but has a good prospective
>>marriage in a Russian-German officer,
>>Adolf Karlovich Berg. Petya (Pyotr
>>Ilyich) is nine and the
>>youngest of the Rostov family;
>>like his brother, he is
>>impetuous and eager to join
>>the army when of age.
>>The heads of the family,
>>Count Ilya Rostov and Countess
>>Natalya Rostova, are an affectionate
>>couple but forever worried about
>>their disordered finances.
>>
>>At Bald Hills, the Bolkonskys' country
>>estate, Prince Andrei leaves his
>>terrified, pregnant wife Lise with
>>his eccentric father Prince Nikolai
>>Andreyevich Bolkonsky and his devoutly
>>religious sister Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya,
>>and departs for the war.
>>
>>
>>The second part opens with descriptions
>>of the impending Russian-French war
>>preparations. At the Sch?ngrabern engagement,
>>Nikolai Rostov, who is now
>>conscripted as ensign in a
>>squadron of hussars, has his
>>first taste of battle. He
>>meets Prince Andrei, whom he
>>insults in a fit of
>>impetuousness. Even more than most
>>young soldiers, he is deeply
>>attracted by Tsar Alexander's charisma.
>>Nikolai gambles and socializes with
>>his officer, Vasily Dmitrich Denisov,
>>and befriends the ruthless and
>>perhaps psychopathic Fyodor Ivanovich Dolokhov.
>>
>>
>>[edit] Book/Volume Two
>>Book Two begins with Nikolai Rostov
>>briefly returning home to Moscow
>>on home leave in early
>>1806. Nikolai finds the Rostov
>>family facing financial ruin due
>>to poor estate management. He
>>spends an eventful winter at
>>home, accompanied by his friend
>>Denisov, his officer from the
>>Pavlograd Regiment in which he
>>serves. Natasha has blossomed into
>>a beautiful young girl. Denisov
>>falls in love with her,
>>proposes marriage but is rejected.
>>Although his mother pleads with
>>Nikolai to find himself a
>>good financial prospect in marriage,
>>Nikolai refuses to accede to
>>his mother's request. He promises
>>to marry his childhood sweetheart,
>>the dowry-less Sonya.
>>
>>Pierre Bezukhov, upon finally receiving his
>>massive inheritance, is suddenly transformed
>>from a bumbling young man
>>into the richest and most
>>eligible bachelor in the Russian
>>Empire. Despite rationally knowing that
>>it is wrong, he proposes
>>marriage with Prince Kuragin's beautiful
>>and immoral daughter H?l?ne (Elena
>>Vasilyevna Kuragina), to whom he
>>is sexually attracted. H?l?ne, who
>>is rumoured to be involved
>>in an incestuous affair with
>>her brother, the equally charming
>>and immoral Anatol, tells Pierre
>>that she will never have
>>children with him. H?l?ne has
>>an affair with Dolokhov, who
>>mocks Pierre in public. Pierre
>>loses his temper and challenges
>>Dolokhov, a seasoned dueller and
>>a ruthless killer, to a
>>duel. Unexpectedly, Pierre wounds Dolokhov.
>>H?l?ne denies her affair, but
>>Pierre is convinced of her
>>guilt and, after almost being
>>violent to her, leaves her.
>>In his moral and spiritual
>>confusion, he joins the Freemasons,
>>and becomes embroiled in Masonic
>>internal politics. Much of Book
>>Two concerns his struggles with
>>his passions and his spiritual
>>conflicts to be a better
>>man. Now a rich aristocrat,
>>he abandons his former carefree
>>behavior and enters upon a
>>philosophical quest particular to Tolstoy:
>>how should one live a
>>moral life in an ethically
>>imperfect world? The question continually
>>baffles and confuses Pierre. He
>>attempts to liberate his serfs,
>>but ultimately achieves nothing of
>>note.
>>
>>Pierre is vividly contrasted with the
>>intelligent and ambitious Prince Andrei
>>Bolkonsky. At the Battle of
>>Austerlitz, Andrei is inspired by
>>a vision of glory to
>>lead a charge of a
>>straggling army. He suffers a
>>near fatal artillery wound. In
>>the face of death, Andrei
>>realizes all his former ambitions
>>are pointless and his former
>>hero Napoleon (who rescues him
>>in a horseback excursion to
>>the battlefield) is apparently as
>>vain as himself.
>>
>>Prince Andrei recovers from his injuries
>>in a military hospital and
>>returns home, only to find
>>his wife Lise dying in
>>childbirth. He is stricken by
>>his guilty conscience for not
>>treating Lise better when she
>>was alive and is haunted
>>by the pitiful expression on
>>his dead wife's face. His
>>child, Nikolenka, survives.
>>
>>Burdened with nihilistic disillusionment, Prince Andrei
>>does not return to the
>>army but chooses to remain
>>on his estate, working on
>>a project that would codify
>>military behavior and help solve
>>some of the problems of
>>Russian disorganization that he believes
>>were responsible for the loss
>>of life in battle on
>>the Russian side. Pierre comes
>>to visit him and brings
>>new questions: where is God
>>in this amoral world? Pierre
>>is interested in panentheism and
>>the possibility of an afterlife.
>>
>>
>>Pierre's estranged wife, H?l?ne, begs him
>>to take her back, and
>>against his better judgment he
>>does. Despite her vapid shallowness,
>>H?l?ne establishes herself as an
>>influential hostess in Petersburg society.
>>
>>
>>Prince Andrei feels impelled to take
>>his newly written military notions
>>to Petersburg, naively expecting to
>>influence either the Emperor himself
>>or those close to him.
>>Young Natasha, also in Petersburg,
>>is caught up in the
>>excitement of dressing for her
>>first grand ball, where she
>>meets Prince Andrei and briefly
>>reinvigorates him with her vivacious
>>charm. Andrei believes he has
>>found purpose in life again
>>and, after paying the Rostovs
>>several visits, proposes marriage to
>>Natasha. However, old Prince Bolkonsky,
>>Andrei's father, dislikes the Rostovs,
>>opposes the marriage, and insists
>>on a year's delay. Prince
>>Andrei leaves to recuperate from
>>his wounds abroad, leaving Natasha
>>initially distraught. She soon recovers
>>her spirits, however, and Count
>>Rostov takes her and Sonya
>>to spend some time with
>>a friend in Moscow.
>>
>>Natasha visits the Moscow opera, where
>>she meets H?l?ne and her
>>brother Anatol. Anatol has since
>>married a Polish woman whom
>>he has abandoned in Poland.
>>He is very attracted to
>>Natasha and is determined to
>>seduce her. H?l?ne and Anatol
>>conspire together to accomplish this
>>plan. Anatol kisses Natasha and
>>writes her passionate letters, eventually
>>establishing plans to elope. Natasha
>>is convinced that she loves
>>Anatol and writes to Princess
>>Maria, Andrei's sister, breaking off
>>her engagement. At the last
>>moment, Sonya discovers her plans
>>to elope and foils them.
>>Pierre is initially shocked and
>>horrified at Natasha's behavior, but
>>comes to realize he has
>>fallen in love with her
>>himself. During the time when
>>the Great Comet of 1811?2
>>streaks the sky, life appears
>>to begin anew for Pierre.
>>
>>
>>Prince Andrei accepts coldly Natasha's breaking
>>of the engagement. He tells
>>Pierre that his pride will
>>not allow him to renew
>>his proposal of marriage. Shamed
>>by her near-seduction and at
>>the realisation that Andrei will
>>not forgive her, Natasha makes
>>a suicide attempt and is
>>left seriously ill.
>>
>>[edit] Book/Volume Three
>>With the help of her family,
>>especially Sonya, and the stirrings
>>of religious faith, Natasha manages
>>to persevere in Moscow through
>>this dark period. Meanwhile, the
>>whole of Russia is affected
>>by the coming showdown between
>>Napoleon's troops and the Russian
>>army. Pierre convinces himself through
>>gematria that Napoleon is the
>>Antichrist of the Book of
>>Revelation. Old prince Bolkonsky dies
>>of a stroke while trying
>>to protect his estate from
>>French marauders. No organized help
>>from any Russian army seems
>>available to the Bolkonskys, but
>>Nikolai Rostov turns up at
>>their estate in time to
>>help put down an incipient
>>peasant revolt. He finds himself
>>attracted to Princess Maria, but
>>remembers his promise to Sonya.
>>
>>
>>Back in Moscow, the war-obsessed Petya
>>manages to snatch a loose
>>piece of the Tsar's biscuit
>>outside the Cathedral of the
>>Assumption; he finally convinces his
>>parents to allow him to
>>enlist.
>>
>>Napoleon himself is a main character
>>in this section of the
>>novel and is presented in
>>vivid detail, as both thinker
>>and would-be strategist. His toilette
>>and his customary attitudes and
>>traits of mind are depicted
>>in detail. Also described are
>>the well-organized force of over
>>400,000 French Army (only 140,000
>>of them actually French-speaking) which
>>marches quickly through the Russian
>>countryside in the late summer
>>and reaches the outskirts of
>>the city of Smolensk. Pierre
>>decides to leave Moscow and
>>go to watch the Battle
>>of Borodino from a vantage
>>point next to a Russian
>>artillery crew. After watching for
>>a time, he begins to
>>join in carrying ammunition. In
>>the midst of the turmoil
>>he experiences firsthand the death
>>and destruction of war. The
>>battle becomes a hideous slaughter
>>for both armies and ends
>>in a standoff. The Russians,
>>however, have won a moral
>>victory by standing up to
>>Napoleon's reputedly invincible army. For
>>strategic reasons and having suffered
>>grievous losses, the Russian army
>>withdraws the next day, allowing
>>Napoleon to march on to
>>Moscow. Among the casualties are
>>Anatol Kuragin and Prince Andrei.
>>Anatol loses a leg, and
>>Andrei suffers a cannon wound
>>in the abdomen. Both are
>>reported dead, but their families
>>are in such disarray that
>>no one can be notified.
>>
>>
>>[edit] Book/Volume Four
>>The Rostovs have waited until the
>>last minute to abandon Moscow,
>>even after it is clear
>>that Kutuzov has retreated past
>>Moscow and Muscovites are being
>>given contradictory, often propagandistic, instructions
>>on how to either flee
>>or fight. Count Rostopchin is
>>publishing posters, rousing the citizens
>>to put their faith in
>>religious icons, while at the
>>same time urging them to
>>fight with pitchforks if necessary.
>>Before fleeing himself, he gives
>>orders to burn the city.
>>The Rostovs have a difficult
>>time deciding what to take
>>with them, and in the
>>end load their carts with
>>the wounded and dying from
>>the Battle of Borodino. Unknown
>>to Natasha, Prince Andrei is
>>amongst the wounded.
>>
>>When Napoleon's Grand Army finally occupies
>>an abandoned and burning Moscow,
>>Pierre takes off on a
>>quixotic mission to assassinate Napoleon.
>>He becomes an anonymous man
>>in all the chaos, shedding
>>his responsibilities by wearing peasant
>>clothes and shunning his duties
>>and lifestyle. The only people
>>he sees while in this
>>garb are Natasha and some
>>of her family, as they
>>depart Moscow. Natasha recognizes and
>>smiles at him, and he
>>in turn realizes the full
>>scope of his love for
>>her.
>>
>>Pierre saves the life of a
>>French officer who fought at
>>Borodino, yet is taken prisoner
>>by the retreating French after
>>his attempted assassination of Napoleon.
>>He becomes friends with a
>>fellow prisoner, Platon Karataev, a
>>peasant with a saintly demeanor,
>>who is incapable of malice.
>>In Karataev, Pierre finally finds
>>what he has been seeking:
>>an honest person of integrity
>>(unlike the aristocrats of Petersburg
>>society) who is utterly without
>>pretense. Pierre discovers meaning in
>>life simply by living and
>>interacting with him. After witnessing
>>French soldiers sacking Moscow and
>>shooting Russian civilians arbitrarily, Pierre
>>is forced to march with
>>the Grand Army during its
>>disastrous retreat from Moscow in
>>the harsh Russian winter. After
>>months of trial and tribulation?during
>>which the fever-plagued Karataev is
>>shot by the French?Pierre is
>>finally freed by a Russian
>>raiding party, after a small
>>skirmish with the French that
>>sees the young Petya Rostov
>>killed in action.
>>
>>Meanwhile, Andrei, wounded during Napoleon's invasion,
>>has been taken in as
>>a casualty and cared for
>>by the fleeing Rostovs. He
>>is reunited with Natasha and
>>his sister Maria before the
>>end of the war. Having
>>lost all will to live,
>>he forgives Natasha in a
>>last act before dying.
>>
>>As the novel draws to a
>>close, Pierre's wife H?l?ne dies
>>in a botched operation (implied
>>to be an abortion). Pierre
>>is reunited with Natasha, while
>>the victorious Russians rebuild Moscow.
>>Natasha speaks of Prince Andrei's
>>death and Pierre of Karataev's.
>>Both are aware of a
>>growing bond between them in
>>their bereavement. With the help
>>of Princess Maria, Pierre finds
>>love at last and, revealing
>>his love after being released
>>by his former wife's death,
>>marries Natasha.
>>
>>[edit] Epilogues
>>The first epilogue begins with the
>>wedding of Pierre and Natasha
>>in 1813. It is the
>>last happy event for the
>>Rostov family, which is undergoing
>>a transition. Count Rostov dies
>>soon after, leaving his eldest
>>son Nikolai to take charge
>>of the debt-ridden estate.
>>
>>Nikolai finds himself with the task
>>of maintaining the family on
>>the verge of bankruptcy. His
>>abhorrence at the idea of
>>marrying for wealth almost gets
>>in his way, but finally
>>in spite of rather than
>>according to his mother's wishes,
>>he marries the now-rich Maria
>>Bolkonskaya and in so doing
>>also saves his family from
>>financial ruin.
>>
>>Nikolai and Maria then move to
>>Bald Hills with his mother
>>and Sonya, whom he supports
>>for the rest of their
>>life. Buoyed by his wife's
>>fortune, Nikolai pays off all
>>his family's debts. They also
>>raise Prince Andrei's orphaned son,
>>Nikolai Andreyevich (Nikolenka) Bolkonsky.
>>
>>As in all good marriages, there
>>are misunderstandings, but the couples?Pierre
>>and Natasha, Nikolai and Maria?remain
>>devoted to their spouses. Pierre
>>and Natasha visit Bald Hills
>>in 1820, much to the
>>jubilation of everyone concerned. There
>>is a hint in the
>>closing chapters that the idealistic,
>>boyish Nikolenka and Pierre would
>>both become part of the
>>Decembrist Uprising. The first epilogue
>>concludes with Nikolenka promising he
>>would do something with which
>>even his late father "would
>>be satisfied..." (presumably as a
>>revolutionary in the Decembrist revolt).
>>
>>
>>The second epilogue contains Tolstoy's critique
>>of all existing forms of
>>mainstream history. He attempts to
>>show that there is a
>>great force behind history, which
>>he first terms divine. He
>>offers the entire book as
>>evidence of this force, and
>>critiques his own work. God,
>>therefore, becomes the word Tolstoy
>>uses to refer to all
>>the forces that produce history,
>>taken together and operating behind
>>the scenes.
>>
>>[edit] Principal characters in War and
>>Peace
>>Main article: List of characters in
>>War and Peace
>>
>>War and Peace character treeCount Pyotr
>>Kirillovich (Pierre) Bezukhov ? The
>>central character and often a
>>voice for Tolstoy's own beliefs
>>or struggles. He is one
>>of several illegitimate children of
>>Count Bezukhov; he is his
>>father's favorite offspring.
>>Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky ? A
>>strong but cynical, thoughtful and
>>philosophical aide-de-camp in the Napoleonic
>>Wars.
>>Princess Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya ? A
>>pious woman whose eccentric father
>>attempted to give her a
>>good education. The caring, nurturing
>>nature of her large eyes
>>in her otherwise thin and
>>plain face are frequently mentioned.
>>
>>Count Ilya Andreyevich Rostov ? The
>>pater-familias of the Rostov family;
>>terrible with finances, generous to
>>a fault.
>>Countess Natalya Rostova ? Wife of
>>Count Ilya Rostov, mother of
>>the four Rostov children.
>>Countess Natalia Ilyinichna (Natasha) Rostova ?
>>Introduced as a beautiful and
>>romantic young girl, she evolves
>>through trials and suffering and
>>eventually finds happiness. She is
>>an accomplished singer and dancer.[citation
>>needed]
>>Count Nikolai Ilyich Rostov ? A
>>hussar, the beloved eldest son
>>of the Rostov family.
>>Sofia Alexandrovna (Sonya) Rostova ? Orphaned
>>cousin of Vera, Nikolai, Natasha
>>and Petya Rostov.
>>Countess Vera Ilyinichna Rostova ? Eldest
>>of the Rostov children, she
>>marries the German career soldier,
>>Berg.
>>Pyotr Ilyich (Petya) Rostov ? Youngest
>>of the Rostov children.
>>Prince Vasily Sergeyevich Kuragin ? A
>>ruthless man who is determined
>>to marry his children well,
>>despite having doubts about the
>>character of some of them.
>>
>>Princess Elena Vasilyevna (H?l?ne) Kuragina ?
>>A beautiful and sexually alluring
>>woman who has many affairs,
>>including (it is rumoured) with
>>her brother Anatole
>>Prince Anatol Vasilyevich Kuragin ? H?l?ne's
>>brother and a very handsome,
>>ruthless and amoral pleasure seeker
>>who is secretly married yet
>>tries to elope with Natasha
>>Rostova.
>>Prince Ipolit Vasilyevich ? The eldest
>>and perhaps most dim-witted of
>>the Kuragin children.
>>Prince Boris Drubetskoy ? A poor
>>but aristocratic young man who
>>is determined to make his
>>career, even at the expense
>>of his friends and benefactors,
>>marries a rich and ugly
>>woman to help him climb
>>the social ladder.
>>Princess Anna Mikhailovna Drubetskoya ? The
>>mother of Boris.
>>Fyodor Ivanovich Dolokhov ? A cold,
>>almost psychopathic officer, he ruins
>>Nikolai Rostov after his proposal
>>to Sonya is refused, he
>>only shows love to his
>>doting mother.
>>Adolf Karlovich Berg ? A young
>>Russian officer, who desires to
>>be just like everyone else.
>>
>>Anna Pavlovna Sherer ? Also known
>>as Annette, she is the
>>hostess of the salon that
>>is the site of much
>>of the novel's action in
>>Petersburg.
>>Maria Dmitryevna Akhrosimova ? An older
>>Moscow society lady, she is
>>an elegant dancer and trend-setter,
>>despite her age and size.
>>
>>Amalia Evgenyevna Bourienne ? A French
>>woman who lives with the
>>Bolkonskys, primarily as Princess Marya's
>>companion.
>>Vasily Dmitrich Denisov ? Nikolai Rostov's
>>friend and brother officer, who
>>proposes to Natasha.
>>Platon Krataev - The archetypal good
>>Russian peasant, whom Pierre meets
>>in the prisoner of war
>>camp.
>>Napoleon I of France ? the
>>Great Man, whose fate is
>>detailed in the book.
>>General Mikhail Ilarionovich Kutuzov ? Russian
>>commander-in-chief throughout the book. His
>>diligence and modesty eventually save
>>Russia from Napoleon.[citation needed]
>>Osip Bazdeyev ? the Freemason who
>>interests Pierre in his mysterious
>>group, starting a lengthy subplot.[citation
>>needed]
>>Tsar Alexander I of Russia ?
>>He signed a peace treaty
>>with Napoleon in 1807 and
>>then went to war with
>>him.
>>Many of Tolstoy's characters in War
>>and Peace were based on
>>real-life people known to Tolstoy
>>himself. His grandparents and their
>>friends were the models for
>>many of the main characters,
>>his great-grandparents would have been
>>of the generation of Prince
>>Vasilly or Count Ilya Rostov.
>>Some of the characters, obviously,
>>are actual historic figures.
>>
>>[edit] Adaptations
>>[edit] Film
>>The first Russian film adaptation of
>>War and Peace was the
>>1915 film Война и мир
>>(Voyna i mir), directed by
>>Vladimir Gardin and starring Gardin
>>and the Russian ballerina Vera
>>Karalli. It was followed in
>>1968 by the critically acclaimed
>>four-part film version War and
>>Peace, by the Soviet director
>>Sergei Bondarchuk, released individually in
>>1965-1967, and as a re-edited
>>whole in 1968. This starred
>>Lyudmila Savelyeva (as Natasha Rostova)
>>and Vyacheslav Tikhonov (as Andrei
>>Bolkonsky). Bondarchuk himself played the
>>character of Pierre Bezukhov. The
>>film was almost seven hours
>>long; it involved thousands of
>>actors, 120 000 extras, and
>>it took seven years to
>>finish the shooting, as a
>>result of which the actors
>>age changed dramatically from scene
>>to scene. It won an
>>Oscar for Best Foreign Language
>>Film for its authenticity and
>>massive scale. [2]
>>
>>The novel has been adapted twice
>>for cinema outside of Russia.
>>The first of these was
>>produced by F. Kamei in
>>Japan (1947). The second was
>>the 208-minute long 1956 War
>>and Peace, directed by the
>>American King Vidor. This starred
>>Audrey Hepburn (Natasha), Henry Fonda
>>(Pierre) and Mel Ferrer (Andrei).
>>Audrey Hepburn was nominated for
>>a BAFTA Award for best
>>British actress and for a
>>Golden Globe Award for best
>>actress in a drama production.
>>
>>
>>[edit] Opera
>>Initiated by a proposal of the
>>German director Erwin Piscator in
>>1938, the Russian composer Sergei
>>Prokofiev composed his opera War
>>and Peace based on this
>>epic novel during the 1940s.
>>The complete musical work premiered
>>in Leningrad in 1955. It
>>was the first opera to
>>be given a public performance
>>at the Sydney Opera House
>>(1973).[19]
>>[edit] Music
>>War and Peace (Op. 91) (Russian:
>>Война и мир, Voyna i
>>mir) is an opera by
>>Sergei Prokofiev, with a libretto
>>by Mira Mendelson, and is
>>based on the novel.
>>Composition by Nino Rota [3]
>>Referring to album notes on http://www.yesworld.com/,
>>the first track "The Gates
>>of Delirium", from the album
>>Relayer, by the progressive rock
>>group Yes, is said to
>>be based loosely on the
>>novel.
>>[edit] Theatre
>>The first successful stage adaptations of
>>War and Peace were produced
>>by Alfred Neumann and Erwin
>>Piscator (1942, revised 1955, published
>>by Macgibbon & Kee in
>>London 1963, and staged in
>>16 countries since) and R.
>>Lucas (1943).
>>
>>A stage adaptation by Helen Edmundson,
>>first produced in 1996 at
>>the Royal National Theatre, was
>>published that year by Nick
>>Hern Books, London. Edmundson added
>>to and amended the play[4]
>>for a 2008 production as
>>two 3-hour parts by Shared
>>Experience, directed by Nancy Meckler
>>and Polly Teale.[5] This was
>>first put on at the
>>Nottingham Playhouse, then toured in
>>the UK to Liverpool, Darlington,
>>Bath, Warwick, Oxford, Truro, London
>>(the Hampstead Theatre) and Cheltenham.
>>
>>
>>On the 15th-18th july, The Birmingham
>>Theatre School performed this 7
>>hour epic play at The
>>Crescent Theatre in Brindleyplace with
>>great success. Birmingham Theatre School
>>is the only drama school
>>in the world to perform
>>the new adaptation of War
>>and Peace. Directed by Chris
>>Rozanski and Assistant to Director
>>was Royal National Theatre performer
>>Anthony Mark Barrow with Vocals
>>arranged by Dr Ria Keen
>>and choreography by Colin Lang.
>>
>>
>>[edit] Radio and television
>>In December 1970, Pacifica Radio station
>>WBAI broadcast a reading of
>>the entire novel (the 1968
>>Dunnigan translation) read by over
>>140 celebrities and ordinary people.
>>[6]
>>War and Peace (1972): The BBC
>>(British Broadcasting Corporation) made a
>>television serial based on the
>>novel, broadcast in 1972-73. Anthony
>>Hopkins played the lead role
>>of Pierre. Other lead characters
>>were played by Rupert Davies,
>>Faith Brook, Morag Hood, Alan
>>Dobie, Angela Down and Sylvester
>>Morand. This version faithfully included
>>many of Tolstoy's minor characters,
>>including Platon Karataev (Harry Locke).
>>[7], [8]
>>A dramatized full-cast adaptation in ten
>>parts was written by Marcy
>>Kahan and Mike Walker in
>>1997. The production won the
>>1998 Talkie award for Best
>>Drama and was around 9.5
>>hours in length. It was
>>directed by Janet Whitaker and
>>featured Simon Russell Beale, Gerard
>>Murphy, Richard Johnson, and others.[20]
>>
>>La Guerre et la paix (TV)
>>(2000) by Fran?ois Roussillon. Robert
>>Brubaker played the lead role
>>of Pierre.[9]
>>War and Peace (2007): produced by
>>the Italian Lux Vide, a
>>TV mini-series in Russian &
>>English co-produced in Russia, France,
>>Germany, Poland and Italy. Directed
>>by Robert Dornhelm, with screenplay
>>written by Lorenzo Favella, Enrico
>>Medioli and Gavin Scott. It
>>features an international cast with
>>Alexander Beyer playing the lead
>>role of Pierre assisted by
>>Malcolm McDowell, Cl?mence Po?sy, Alessio
>>Boni, Pilar Abella, J. Kimo
>>Arbas, Ken Duken, Juozapas Bagdonas
>>and Toni Bertorelli.[10]
>>[edit] Full translations into English
>>Clara Bell (from a French version)
>>1885-86
>>W. H. Dole 1889
>>Leo Wiener 1904
>>Constance Garnett (1904)
>>Louise and Aylmer Maude (1922-3)
>>Rosemary Edmonds (1957, revised 1978)
>>Ann Dunnigan (1968)
>>Anthony Briggs (2005)
>>Andrew Bromfield (2007), translation of the
>>first completed draft, approx. 400
>>pages shorter than other English
>>translations.[3]
>>Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (2007)
>>
>>[edit] See also
>>List of characters in War and
>>Peace
>>List of historical novels
>>Natasha's Dance by Orlando Figes, a
>>cultural history of Russia using
>>the name of the main
>>female character [11]
>>[edit] References
>>^ Moser, Charles. 1992. Encyclopedia of
>>Russian Literature. Cambridge University Press.
>>Pp. 298?300.; Thirwell, Adam. 2005.
>>"A masterpiece in miniature." London:
>>Guardian UK, October 8; Briggs,
>>Anthony. 2005. "Introduction" to War
>>and Peace. Penguin Classics.
>>^ Knowles, A.V. Leo Tolstoy, Routledge
>>1997.
>>^ Newsweek's Top 100 Books: The
>>Meta-List, retrieved on 07 July
>>2009
>>^ "Introduction?". War and Peace. Wordsworth
>>Editions. 1993. http://books.google.com/books?id=c4...mcH3Cw&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=3&ct=result. Retrieved 2009-03-24.
>>
>>^ Feuer, Kathryn.
>>^ Emerson, Caryl. 1985. "The Tolstoy
>>Connection in Bakhtin", in PMLA,
>>Vol 100, No 1, pp.
>>69-71. Modern Language Association.
>>^ Emerson, Caryl. 1985. Ibid, p.
>>68-69
>>^ Feuer, Kathryn B. 1996
>>^ Pearson and Volokhonsky op cit.
>>
>>^ cf. Knowles 1997, Feuer 1996
>>
>>^ Feuer 1996
>>^ "Introduction to War and Peace"
>>by Richard Peaver in Peaver,
>>Richard and Larissa Volokhonsky, War
>>and Peace, 2008, Vintage Classics.
>>
>>^ Greenwood, Edward Baker (1980). "What
>>is War and Peace?". Tolstoy:
>>The Comprehensive Vision. London: Taylor
>>& Francis. p. 83. ISBN
>>0416741304. http://books.google.com/books?id=ta...tcover&hl=ru&source=gbs_summary_r&cad&pg=PA83.
>>^ Figes, O, Tolstoy's Real Hero.
>>NYRB 22 Nov 2007,pp 4-7.
>>
>>^ a b Figes O (November
>>22, 2007). "Tolstoy?s Real Hero".
>>The New York Review of
>>Books, Volume 54, Number 18.
>>
>>^ Feuer, Kathryn B. Tolstoy and
>>the Genesis of War and
>>Peace, Cornell University Press, 1996
>>(First Edition)
>>^ Troyat, Henri. Tolstoy, a biography.
>>Doubleday, 1967.
>>^ [1]
>>^ Sydney Opera House: History -
>>highlights
>>^ "Marcy Kahan Radio Plays". War
>>And Peace (Radio Dramatization). http://web.ukonline.co.uk/suttonelms/mkahan.html.
>>Retrieved 2010-01-20.
>>[edit] External links
>> Wikisource has original text related
>>to this article:
>>War and Peace
>>English translation at gutenberg
>>Searchable version of the gutenberg text
>>in multiple formats SiSU
>>War and Peace, complete text with
>>accompanying audio.
>>Full text of War and Peace
>>in modern Russian orthography
>>An audio version of Book 1
>>of War and Peace (other
>>books are available through links).
>>
>>A searchable online version of Aylmer
>>Maude's English translation of War
>>and Peace
>>SparkNotes Study Guide for "War and
>>Peace"
>>Birth, death, balls and battles by
>>Orlando Figes. This is an
>>edited version of an essay
>>found in the Penguin Classics
>>new translation of War and
>>Peace (2005).
>>Homage to War and Peace Searchable
>>map, compiled by Nicholas Jenkins,
>>of places named in Tolstoy's
>>novel (2008).
>>Russian Army during the Napoleonic Wars
>>
>>The War and Peace Broadcast: 35th
>>Anniversary, from Pacifica Radio Archives
>>site
>>War and Peace at the Internet
>>Book List
>>Radio documentary about 1970 marathon reading
>>of War and Peace on
>>WBAI, from Democracy Now! program,
>>December 6, 2005
>>Disscusion-Forum at Reading Group Guides
>
>Thanks Nv......Ha!
>
>Robb

Onedryboot, I had no idea until now either...
NVB, nice signature!!

~Z~
 
Excessive band width
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I dont know what to say....but I just teared up from laughing so hard!! Holy Shiz! even though this thread is extremely random, I just found it very entertaining!!LMAO!! Bess I feel sorry for you from the standpoint of NV rubbing this in your face:) Damn boys this just made my day.
 
>>
>>I may just use this as
>>my signature
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>War and Peace (Russian: Война и
>>мир, Voyn? i mir), a
>>Russian novel by Leo Tolstoy,
>>is considered one of the
>>world's greatest works of fiction.<1>
>>It is regarded, along with
>>Anna Karenina (1873?1877), as his
>>finest literary achievement.
>>
>>Epic in scale, War and Peace
>>delineates in graphic detail events
>>leading up to Napoleon's invasion
>>of Russia, and the impact
>>of the Napoleonic era on
>>Tsarist society, as seen through
>>the eyes of five Russian
>>aristocratic families.
>>
>>Portions of an earlier version having
>>been serialized in the magazine
>>The Russian Messenger between 1865
>>and 1867, the novel was
>>first published in its entirety
>>in 1869.<2> Newsweek in 2009
>>ranked it top of its
>>list of Top 100 Books.<3>
>>
>>
>>Tolstoy himself, somewhat enigmatically, said of
>>War and Peace that it
>>was "not a novel, even
>>less is it a poem,
>>and still less an historical
>>chronicle."<4>
>>
>>Contents
>>1 Crafting the novel
>>1.1 Realism
>>2 Reception
>>3 Language
>>3.1 English translations
>>4 Background and historical context
>>5 Plot summary
>>5.1 Book/Volume One
>>5.2 Book/Volume Two
>>5.3 Book/Volume Three
>>5.4 Book/Volume Four
>>5.5 Epilogues
>>6 Principal characters in War and
>>Peace
>>7 Adaptations
>>7.1 Film
>>7.2 Opera
>>7.3 Music
>>7.4 Theatre
>>7.5 Radio and television
>>7.6 Full translations into English
>>8 See also
>>9 References
>>10 External links
>>
>>
>> Crafting the novel
>>
>>An undated photograph of Leo Tolstoy
>>dressed for the Russian weatherWar
>>and Peace is famously long
>>for a novel (though not
>>the longest by any means).
>>It is subdivided into four
>>books or volumes, each with
>>subparts containing many chapters.
>>
>>Tolstoy got the title, and some
>>of his themes, from an
>>1861 work of Proudhon: La
>>Guerre et la Paix. Tolstoy
>>had served in the Crimean
>>War and written a series
>>of short stories and novellas
>>featuring scenes of war. He
>>began writing War and Peace
>>in the year that he
>>finally married and settled down
>>at his country estate. During
>>the writing of the second
>>half of the book, after
>>the first half had already
>>been written under the name
>>"1805", he read widely, acknowledging
>>Schopenhauer as one of his
>>main inspirations, although he developed
>>his own views of history
>>and the role of the
>>individual within it.<5>
>>
>>The novel can be generally classified
>>as historical fiction. It contains
>>elements present in many types
>>of popular 18th and 19th
>>century literature, especially the romance
>>novel. War and Peace attains
>>its literary status by transcending
>>genres. Tolstoy was instrumental in
>>bringing a new kind of
>>consciousness to the novel. His
>>narrative structure is noted for
>>its "god-like" ability to hover
>>over and within events, but
>>also swiftly and seamlessly to
>>take a particular character's point
>>of view.<6> His use of
>>visual detail is often cinematic
>>in its scope, using the
>>literary equivalents of panning, wide
>>shots and close-ups, to give
>>dramatic interest to battles and
>>ballrooms alike. These devices, while
>>not exclusive to Tolstoy, are
>>part of the new novel
>>that is arising in the
>>mid-19th century and of which
>>Tolstoy proves himself a master.<7>
>>
>>
>> Realism
>>Tolstoy incorporated extensive historical research, and
>>he was influenced by many
>>other novels as well.<8> Himself
>>a veteran of the Crimean
>>War, Tolstoy was quite critical
>>of standard history, especially the
>>standards of military history, in
>>War and Peace. Tolstoy read
>>all the standard histories available
>>in Russian and French about
>>the Napoleonic Wars and combined
>>more traditional historical writing with
>>the novel form - he
>>explains at the start of
>>the novel's third volume his
>>views on how history ought
>>to be written. His aim
>>was to blur the line
>>between fiction and history, in
>>order to get closer to
>>the truth, as he states
>>in Volume II.
>>
>>The novel is set 60 years
>>earlier than the time at
>>which Tolstoy wrote it, "in
>>the days of our grandfathers",
>>as he puts it. He
>>had spoken with people who
>>had lived through the war
>>of 1812 (In Russia), so
>>the book is also, in
>>part, accurate ethnography fictionalized. He
>>read letters, journals, autobiographical and
>>biographical materials pertaining to Napoleon
>>and the dozens of other
>>historical characters in the novel.
>>There are approximately 160 real
>>persons named or referred to
>>in War and Peace.<9>
>>
>> Reception
>>The first draft of War and
>>Peace was completed in 1863.
>>In 1865, the periodical Russkiy
>>Vestnik published the first part
>>of this early version under
>>the title 1805 and the
>>following year published more of
>>the same early version. Tolstoy
>>was increasingly dissatisfied with this
>>version, although he allowed several
>>parts of it to be
>>published (with a different ending)
>>in 1867 still under the
>>title "1805" He heavily rewrote
>>the entire novel between 1866
>>and 1869.<10> Tolstoy's wife Sophia
>>Tolstoy handwrote as many as
>>8 or 9 separate complete
>>manuscripts before Tolstoy considered it
>>again ready for publication.<11> The
>>version that was published in
>>Russkiy Vestnik had a very
>>different ending than the version
>>eventually published under the title
>>War and Peace in 1869.
>>
>>
>>The completed novel was then called
>>Voyna i mir (new style
>>orthography; in English War and
>>Peace).
>>
>>Tolstoy did not destroy the 1805
>>manuscript (sometimes referred to as
>>"the original War and Peace"),
>>which was re-edited and annotated
>>in Russia in 1983 and
>>since has been translated separately
>>from the "known" version, to
>>English, German, French, Spanish, Dutch,
>>Swedish, Finnish and Korean. The
>>fact that so many extant
>>versions of War and Peace
>>survive make it one of
>>the best revelations into the
>>mental processes of a great
>>novelist.
>>
>>Russians who had read the serialized
>>version, were anxious to acquire
>>the complete first edition, which
>>included epilogues, and it sold
>>out almost immediately. The novel
>>was translated almost immediately after
>>publication into many other languages.
>>
>>
>>Isaac Babel said, after reading War
>>and Peace, "If the world
>>could write by itself, it
>>would write like Tolstoy."<12> Tolstoy
>>"gives us a unique combination
>>of the 'naive objectivity' of
>>the oral narrator with the
>>interest in detail characteristic of
>>realism. This is the reason
>>for our trust in his
>>presentation."<13>
>>
>> Language
>>Although Tolstoy wrote most of the
>>book, including all the narration,
>>in Russian, significant portions of
>>dialogue (including its opening paragraph)
>>are written in French and
>>characters often switch between the
>>languages. This reflected 19th century
>>reality since Russian aristocracy in
>>the early nineteenth century were
>>conversant in French, which was
>>often considered more refined than
>>Russian?many were much less competent
>>in Russian. An example in
>>the novel is Julie Karagina,
>>Princess Marya's friend, who has
>>to take Russian lessons in
>>order to master her native
>>language.
>>
>>It has been suggested<14> that it
>>is a deliberate strategy of
>>Tolstoy to use French to
>>portray artifice and insincerity, as
>>the language of the theater
>>and deceit while Russian emerges
>>as a language of sincerity,
>>honesty and seriousness. When Pierre
>>proposes to Helene he speaks
>>to her in French?Je vous
>>aime?and as the marriage emerges
>>as a sham he blames
>>those words.
>>
>>As the book progresses, and the
>>wars with the French intensify,
>>culminating in the capture and
>>eventual burning of Moscow, the
>>use of French diminishes. The
>>progressive elimination of French from
>>the text is a means
>>of demonstrating that Russia has
>>freed itself from foreign cultural
>>domination. It is also, at
>>the level of plot development,
>>a way of showing that
>>a once-admired and friendly nation,
>>France, has turned into an
>>enemy. By midway through the
>>book, several of the Russian
>>aristocracy, whose command of French
>>is far better than their
>>command of Russian, are anxious
>>to find Russian tutors for
>>themselves.
>>
>> English translations
>>War and Peace has been translated
>>into English on several occasions,
>>starting by Clara Bell working
>>from a French translation. The
>>translators Constance Garnett and Louise
>>and Aylmer Maude knew Tolstoy
>>personally. Translations have to deal
>>with Tolstoy?s often peculiar syntax
>>and his fondness of repetitions.
>>About 2% of War and
>>Peace is in French; Tolstoy
>>removed the French in a
>>revised 1873 edition, only to
>>restore it later again.<15> Most
>>translators follow Garnett retaining some
>>French, Briggs uses no French,
>>while Pevear-Volokhonsky retain the French
>>fully.<15> (For a list of
>>translations see below)
>>
>> Background and historical context
>>
>>In 1812 by the Russian artist
>>Illarion PryanishnikovThe novel begins in
>>the year 1805 and leads
>>up to the war of
>>1812. The era of
>>Catherine the Great is still
>>fresh in the minds of
>>older people. It was Catherine
>>who ordered the Russian court
>>to change to speaking French,
>>a custom that was stronger
>>in Petersburg than in Moscow.>>needed] Catherine's son and successor,
>>Paul I, is the father
>>of the current Czar, Alexander
>>I. Alexander I came to
>>the throne in 1801 at
>>the age of 24. His
>>mother, Marya Feodorovna, is the
>>most powerful woman in the
>>court.
>>
>>The novel tells the story of
>>five aristocratic families ? the
>>Bezukhovs, the Bolkonskys, the Rostovs,
>>the Kuragins and the Drubetskoys?and
>>the entanglements of their personal
>>lives with the history of
>>1805?1813, principally Napoleon's invasion of
>>Russia in 1812. The Bezukhovs,
>>while very rich, are a
>>fragmented family as the old
>>Count, Kirill Vladimirovich, has fathered
>>dozens of illegitimate sons. The
>>Bolkonskys are an old established
>>and wealthy family based at
>>Bald Hills. Old Prince Bolkonsky,
>>Nikolai Andreevich, served as a
>>general under Catherine the Great,
>>in earlier wars. The Moscow
>>Rostovs have many estates, but
>>never enough cash. They are
>>a closely knit, loving family
>>who live for the moment
>>regardless of their financial situation.
>>The Kuragin family has three
>>children, who are all of
>>questionable character. The Drubetskoy family
>>is of impoverished nobility, and
>>consists of an elderly mother
>>and her only son, Boris,
>>whom she wishes to push
>>up the career ladder.
>>
>>Tolstoy spent years researching and rewriting
>>the book. He worked from
>>primary source materials (interviews and
>>other documents), as well as
>>from history books, philosophy texts
>>and other historical novels.<16> Tolstoy
>>also used a great deal
>>of his own experience in
>>the Crimean War to bring
>>vivid detail and first-hand accounts
>>of how the Russian army
>>was structured.<17>
>>
>>The standard Russian text of 'War
>>and Peace' is divided into
>>four books (fifteen parts) and
>>two epilogues ? one mainly
>>narrative, the other thematic. While
>>roughly the first half of
>>the novel is concerned strictly
>>with the fictional characters, the
>>later parts, as well as
>>one of the work's two
>>epilogues, increasingly consist of essays
>>about the nature of war,
>>power, history, and historiography. Tolstoy
>>interspersed these essays into the
>>story in a way that
>>defies previous fictional convention. Certain
>>abridged versions remove these essays
>>entirely, while others, published even
>>during Tolstoy's life, simply moved
>>these essays into an appendix.
>>
>>
>> Plot summary
>>War and Peace has a huge
>>cast of characters, some historically
>>real, like Napoleon and Alexander
>>I, the majority of whom
>>are introduced in the first
>>book. The scope of the
>>novel is vast, but the
>>focus is primarily on five
>>aristocratic families and their experiences
>>in life. The interactions of
>>these characters are set in
>>the era leading up to,
>>around and following the French
>>invasion of Russia during the
>>Napoleonic wars.<18>
>>
>> Book/Volume One
>>The novel begins in Saint Petersburg,
>>at a soir?e given in
>>July 1805 by Anna Pavlovna
>>Scherer ? the maid of
>>honour and confidante to the
>>queen mother Maria Feodorovna. Many
>>of the main players and
>>aristocratic families of the novel
>>are introduced as they enter
>>Anna Pavlovna's salon. Pierre (Pyotr
>>Kirilovich) Bezukhov is the illegitimate
>>son of a wealthy count,
>>an elderly man who is
>>dying after a series of
>>strokes. He is about to
>>become embroiled in a struggle
>>for his inheritance. Educated abroad
>>after his mother's death and
>>at his father's expense, Pierre
>>is essentially kindhearted, but socially
>>awkward owing in part to
>>his open, benevolent nature, and
>>finds it difficult to integrate
>>into Petersburg society. He is
>>his father's favorite of all
>>the old count's illegitimate children,
>>and this is known to
>>everyone at Anna Pavlovna's.
>>
>>Pierre's friend, the intelligent and sardonic
>>Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky, husband
>>of the charming society favourite
>>Lise, also attends the soire?.
>>Finding Petersburg society unctuous and
>>disillusioned with married life after
>>discovering his wife is empty
>>and superficial, Prince Andrei makes
>>the fateful choice to be
>>an aide-de-camp to Prince Mikhail
>>Ilarionovich Kutuzov in the coming
>>war against Napoleon.
>>
>>The plot then moves to Moscow,
>>Russia's ancient city and former
>>capital, contrasting its provincial, more
>>Russian ways to the highly
>>mannered society of Petersburg. The
>>Rostov family are introduced. Count
>>Ilya Andreyevich Rostov has four
>>adolescent children. Thirteen-year-old Natasha (Natalia
>>Ilyinichna) believes herself in love
>>with Boris Drubetskoy, a disciplined
>>young man who is about
>>to join the army as
>>an officer. Twenty-year-old Nikolai Ilyich
>>pledges his teenage love to
>>Sonya (Sofia Alexandrovna), his fifteen-year-old
>>cousin, an orphan who has
>>been brought up by the
>>Rostovs. The eldest child of
>>the Rostov family, Vera Ilyinichna,
>>is cold and somewhat haughty
>>but has a good prospective
>>marriage in a Russian-German officer,
>>Adolf Karlovich Berg. Petya (Pyotr
>>Ilyich) is nine and the
>>youngest of the Rostov family;
>>like his brother, he is
>>impetuous and eager to join
>>the army when of age.
>>The heads of the family,
>>Count Ilya Rostov and Countess
>>Natalya Rostova, are an affectionate
>>couple but forever worried about
>>their disordered finances.
>>
>>At Bald Hills, the Bolkonskys' country
>>estate, Prince Andrei leaves his
>>terrified, pregnant wife Lise with
>>his eccentric father Prince Nikolai
>>Andreyevich Bolkonsky and his devoutly
>>religious sister Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya,
>>and departs for the war.
>>
>>
>>The second part opens with descriptions
>>of the impending Russian-French war
>>preparations. At the Sch?ngrabern engagement,
>>Nikolai Rostov, who is now
>>conscripted as ensign in a
>>squadron of hussars, has his
>>first taste of battle. He
>>meets Prince Andrei, whom he
>>insults in a fit of
>>impetuousness. Even more than most
>>young soldiers, he is deeply
>>attracted by Tsar Alexander's charisma.
>>Nikolai gambles and socializes with
>>his officer, Vasily Dmitrich Denisov,
>>and befriends the ruthless and
>>perhaps psychopathic Fyodor Ivanovich Dolokhov.
>>
>>
>> Book/Volume Two
>>Book Two begins with Nikolai Rostov
>>briefly returning home to Moscow
>>on home leave in early
>>1806. Nikolai finds the Rostov
>>family facing financial ruin due
>>to poor estate management. He
>>spends an eventful winter at
>>home, accompanied by his friend
>>Denisov, his officer from the
>>Pavlograd Regiment in which he
>>serves. Natasha has blossomed into
>>a beautiful young girl. Denisov
>>falls in love with her,
>>proposes marriage but is rejected.
>>Although his mother pleads with
>>Nikolai to find himself a
>>good financial prospect in marriage,
>>Nikolai refuses to accede to
>>his mother's request. He promises
>>to marry his childhood sweetheart,
>>the dowry-less Sonya.
>>
>>Pierre Bezukhov, upon finally receiving his
>>massive inheritance, is suddenly transformed
>>from a bumbling young man
>>into the richest and most
>>eligible bachelor in the Russian
>>Empire. Despite rationally knowing that
>>it is wrong, he proposes
>>marriage with Prince Kuragin's beautiful
>>and immoral daughter H?l?ne (Elena
>>Vasilyevna Kuragina), to whom he
>>is sexually attracted. H?l?ne, who
>>is rumoured to be involved
>>in an incestuous affair with
>>her brother, the equally charming
>>and immoral Anatol, tells Pierre
>>that she will never have
>>children with him. H?l?ne has
>>an affair with Dolokhov, who
>>mocks Pierre in public. Pierre
>>loses his temper and challenges
>>Dolokhov, a seasoned dueller and
>>a ruthless killer, to a
>>duel. Unexpectedly, Pierre wounds Dolokhov.
>>H?l?ne denies her affair, but
>>Pierre is convinced of her
>>guilt and, after almost being
>>violent to her, leaves her.
>>In his moral and spiritual
>>confusion, he joins the Freemasons,
>>and becomes embroiled in Masonic
>>internal politics. Much of Book
>>Two concerns his struggles with
>>his passions and his spiritual
>>conflicts to be a better
>>man. Now a rich aristocrat,
>>he abandons his former carefree
>>behavior and enters upon a
>>philosophical quest particular to Tolstoy:
>>how should one live a
>>moral life in an ethically
>>imperfect world? The question continually
>>baffles and confuses Pierre. He
>>attempts to liberate his serfs,
>>but ultimately achieves nothing of
>>note.
>>
>>Pierre is vividly contrasted with the
>>intelligent and ambitious Prince Andrei
>>Bolkonsky. At the Battle of
>>Austerlitz, Andrei is inspired by
>>a vision of glory to
>>lead a charge of a
>>straggling army. He suffers a
>>near fatal artillery wound. In
>>the face of death, Andrei
>>realizes all his former ambitions
>>are pointless and his former
>>hero Napoleon (who rescues him
>>in a horseback excursion to
>>the battlefield) is apparently as
>>vain as himself.
>>
>>Prince Andrei recovers from his injuries
>>in a military hospital and
>>returns home, only to find
>>his wife Lise dying in
>>childbirth. He is stricken by
>>his guilty conscience for not
>>treating Lise better when she
>>was alive and is haunted
>>by the pitiful expression on
>>his dead wife's face. His
>>child, Nikolenka, survives.
>>
>>Burdened with nihilistic disillusionment, Prince Andrei
>>does not return to the
>>army but chooses to remain
>>on his estate, working on
>>a project that would codify
>>military behavior and help solve
>>some of the problems of
>>Russian disorganization that he believes
>>were responsible for the loss
>>of life in battle on
>>the Russian side. Pierre comes
>>to visit him and brings
>>new questions: where is God
>>in this amoral world? Pierre
>>is interested in panentheism and
>>the possibility of an afterlife.
>>
>>
>>Pierre's estranged wife, H?l?ne, begs him
>>to take her back, and
>>against his better judgment he
>>does. Despite her vapid shallowness,
>>H?l?ne establishes herself as an
>>influential hostess in Petersburg society.
>>
>>
>>Prince Andrei feels impelled to take
>>his newly written military notions
>>to Petersburg, naively expecting to
>>influence either the Emperor himself
>>or those close to him.
>>Young Natasha, also in Petersburg,
>>is caught up in the
>>excitement of dressing for her
>>first grand ball, where she
>>meets Prince Andrei and briefly
>>reinvigorates him with her vivacious
>>charm. Andrei believes he has
>>found purpose in life again
>>and, after paying the Rostovs
>>several visits, proposes marriage to
>>Natasha. However, old Prince Bolkonsky,
>>Andrei's father, dislikes the Rostovs,
>>opposes the marriage, and insists
>>on a year's delay. Prince
>>Andrei leaves to recuperate from
>>his wounds abroad, leaving Natasha
>>initially distraught. She soon recovers
>>her spirits, however, and Count
>>Rostov takes her and Sonya
>>to spend some time with
>>a friend in Moscow.
>>
>>Natasha visits the Moscow opera, where
>>she meets H?l?ne and her
>>brother Anatol. Anatol has since
>>married a Polish woman whom
>>he has abandoned in Poland.
>>He is very attracted to
>>Natasha and is determined to
>>seduce her. H?l?ne and Anatol
>>conspire together to accomplish this
>>plan. Anatol kisses Natasha and
>>writes her passionate letters, eventually
>>establishing plans to elope. Natasha
>>is convinced that she loves
>>Anatol and writes to Princess
>>Maria, Andrei's sister, breaking off
>>her engagement. At the last
>>moment, Sonya discovers her plans
>>to elope and foils them.
>>Pierre is initially shocked and
>>horrified at Natasha's behavior, but
>>comes to realize he has
>>fallen in love with her
>>himself. During the time when
>>the Great Comet of 1811?2
>>streaks the sky, life appears
>>to begin anew for Pierre.
>>
>>
>>Prince Andrei accepts coldly Natasha's breaking
>>of the engagement. He tells
>>Pierre that his pride will
>>not allow him to renew
>>his proposal of marriage. Shamed
>>by her near-seduction and at
>>the realisation that Andrei will
>>not forgive her, Natasha makes
>>a suicide attempt and is
>>left seriously ill.
>>
>> Book/Volume Three
>>With the help of her family,
>>especially Sonya, and the stirrings
>>of religious faith, Natasha manages
>>to persevere in Moscow through
>>this dark period. Meanwhile, the
>>whole of Russia is affected
>>by the coming showdown between
>>Napoleon's troops and the Russian
>>army. Pierre convinces himself through
>>gematria that Napoleon is the
>>Antichrist of the Book of
>>Revelation. Old prince Bolkonsky dies
>>of a stroke while trying
>>to protect his estate from
>>French marauders. No organized help
>>from any Russian army seems
>>available to the Bolkonskys, but
>>Nikolai Rostov turns up at
>>their estate in time to
>>help put down an incipient
>>peasant revolt. He finds himself
>>attracted to Princess Maria, but
>>remembers his promise to Sonya.
>>
>>
>>Back in Moscow, the war-obsessed Petya
>>manages to snatch a loose
>>piece of the Tsar's biscuit
>>outside the Cathedral of the
>>Assumption; he finally convinces his
>>parents to allow him to
>>enlist.
>>
>>Napoleon himself is a main character
>>in this section of the
>>novel and is presented in
>>vivid detail, as both thinker
>>and would-be strategist. His toilette
>>and his customary attitudes and
>>traits of mind are depicted
>>in detail. Also described are
>>the well-organized force of over
>>400,000 French Army (only 140,000
>>of them actually French-speaking) which
>>marches quickly through the Russian
>>countryside in the late summer
>>and reaches the outskirts of
>>the city of Smolensk. Pierre
>>decides to leave Moscow and
>>go to watch the Battle
>>of Borodino from a vantage
>>point next to a Russian
>>artillery crew. After watching for
>>a time, he begins to
>>join in carrying ammunition. In
>>the midst of the turmoil
>>he experiences firsthand the death
>>and destruction of war. The
>>battle becomes a hideous slaughter
>>for both armies and ends
>>in a standoff. The Russians,
>>however, have won a moral
>>victory by standing up to
>>Napoleon's reputedly invincible army. For
>>strategic reasons and having suffered
>>grievous losses, the Russian army
>>withdraws the next day, allowing
>>Napoleon to march on to
>>Moscow. Among the casualties are
>>Anatol Kuragin and Prince Andrei.
>>Anatol loses a leg, and
>>Andrei suffers a cannon wound
>>in the abdomen. Both are
>>reported dead, but their families
>>are in such disarray that
>>no one can be notified.
>>
>>
>> Book/Volume Four
>>The Rostovs have waited until the
>>last minute to abandon Moscow,
>>even after it is clear
>>that Kutuzov has retreated past
>>Moscow and Muscovites are being
>>given contradictory, often propagandistic, instructions
>>on how to either flee
>>or fight. Count Rostopchin is
>>publishing posters, rousing the citizens
>>to put their faith in
>>religious icons, while at the
>>same time urging them to
>>fight with pitchforks if necessary.
>>Before fleeing himself, he gives
>>orders to burn the city.
>>The Rostovs have a difficult
>>time deciding what to take
>>with them, and in the
>>end load their carts with
>>the wounded and dying from
>>the Battle of Borodino. Unknown
>>to Natasha, Prince Andrei is
>>amongst the wounded.
>>
>>When Napoleon's Grand Army finally occupies
>>an abandoned and burning Moscow,
>>Pierre takes off on a
>>quixotic mission to assassinate Napoleon.
>>He becomes an anonymous man
>>in all the chaos, shedding
>>his responsibilities by wearing peasant
>>clothes and shunning his duties
>>and lifestyle. The only people
>>he sees while in this
>>garb are Natasha and some
>>of her family, as they
>>depart Moscow. Natasha recognizes and
>>smiles at him, and he
>>in turn realizes the full
>>scope of his love for
>>her.
>>
>>Pierre saves the life of a
>>French officer who fought at
>>Borodino, yet is taken prisoner
>>by the retreating French after
>>his attempted assassination of Napoleon.
>>He becomes friends with a
>>fellow prisoner, Platon Karataev, a
>>peasant with a saintly demeanor,
>>who is incapable of malice.
>>In Karataev, Pierre finally finds
>>what he has been seeking:
>>an honest person of integrity
>>(unlike the aristocrats of Petersburg
>>society) who is utterly without
>>pretense. Pierre discovers meaning in
>>life simply by living and
>>interacting with him. After witnessing
>>French soldiers sacking Moscow and
>>shooting Russian civilians arbitrarily, Pierre
>>is forced to march with
>>the Grand Army during its
>>disastrous retreat from Moscow in
>>the harsh Russian winter. After
>>months of trial and tribulation?during
>>which the fever-plagued Karataev is
>>shot by the French?Pierre is
>>finally freed by a Russian
>>raiding party, after a small
>>skirmish with the French that
>>sees the young Petya Rostov
>>killed in action.
>>
>>Meanwhile, Andrei, wounded during Napoleon's invasion,
>>has been taken in as
>>a casualty and cared for
>>by the fleeing Rostovs. He
>>is reunited with Natasha and
>>his sister Maria before the
>>end of the war. Having
>>lost all will to live,
>>he forgives Natasha in a
>>last act before dying.
>>
>>As the novel draws to a
>>close, Pierre's wife H?l?ne dies
>>in a botched operation (implied
>>to be an abortion). Pierre
>>is reunited with Natasha, while
>>the victorious Russians rebuild Moscow.
>>Natasha speaks of Prince Andrei's
>>death and Pierre of Karataev's.
>>Both are aware of a
>>growing bond between them in
>>their bereavement. With the help
>>of Princess Maria, Pierre finds
>>love at last and, revealing
>>his love after being released
>>by his former wife's death,
>>marries Natasha.
>>
>> Epilogues
>>The first epilogue begins with the
>>wedding of Pierre and Natasha
>>in 1813. It is the
>>last happy event for the
>>Rostov family, which is undergoing
>>a transition. Count Rostov dies
>>soon after, leaving his eldest
>>son Nikolai to take charge
>>of the debt-ridden estate.
>>
>>Nikolai finds himself with the task
>>of maintaining the family on
>>the verge of bankruptcy. His
>>abhorrence at the idea of
>>marrying for wealth almost gets
>>in his way, but finally
>>in spite of rather than
>>according to his mother's wishes,
>>he marries the now-rich Maria
>>Bolkonskaya and in so doing
>>also saves his family from
>>financial ruin.
>>
>>Nikolai and Maria then move to
>>Bald Hills with his mother
>>and Sonya, whom he supports
>>for the rest of their
>>life. Buoyed by his wife's
>>fortune, Nikolai pays off all
>>his family's debts. They also
>>raise Prince Andrei's orphaned son,
>>Nikolai Andreyevich (Nikolenka) Bolkonsky.
>>
>>As in all good marriages, there
>>are misunderstandings, but the couples?Pierre
>>and Natasha, Nikolai and Maria?remain
>>devoted to their spouses. Pierre
>>and Natasha visit Bald Hills
>>in 1820, much to the
>>jubilation of everyone concerned. There
>>is a hint in the
>>closing chapters that the idealistic,
>>boyish Nikolenka and Pierre would
>>both become part of the
>>Decembrist Uprising. The first epilogue
>>concludes with Nikolenka promising he
>>would do something with which
>>even his late father "would
>>be satisfied..." (presumably as a
>>revolutionary in the Decembrist revolt).
>>
>>
>>The second epilogue contains Tolstoy's critique
>>of all existing forms of
>>mainstream history. He attempts to
>>show that there is a
>>great force behind history, which
>>he first terms divine. He
>>offers the entire book as
>>evidence of this force, and
>>critiques his own work. God,
>>therefore, becomes the word Tolstoy
>>uses to refer to all
>>the forces that produce history,
>>taken together and operating behind
>>the scenes.
>>
>> Principal characters in War and
>>Peace
>>Main article: List of characters in
>>War and Peace
>>
>>War and Peace character treeCount Pyotr
>>Kirillovich (Pierre) Bezukhov ? The
>>central character and often a
>>voice for Tolstoy's own beliefs
>>or struggles. He is one
>>of several illegitimate children of
>>Count Bezukhov; he is his
>>father's favorite offspring.
>>Prince Andrei Nikolayevich Bolkonsky ? A
>>strong but cynical, thoughtful and
>>philosophical aide-de-camp in the Napoleonic
>>Wars.
>>Princess Maria Nikolayevna Bolkonskaya ? A
>>pious woman whose eccentric father
>>attempted to give her a
>>good education. The caring, nurturing
>>nature of her large eyes
>>in her otherwise thin and
>>plain face are frequently mentioned.
>>
>>Count Ilya Andreyevich Rostov ? The
>>pater-familias of the Rostov family;
>>terrible with finances, generous to
>>a fault.
>>Countess Natalya Rostova ? Wife of
>>Count Ilya Rostov, mother of
>>the four Rostov children.
>>Countess Natalia Ilyinichna (Natasha) Rostova ?
>>Introduced as a beautiful and
>>romantic young girl, she evolves
>>through trials and suffering and
>>eventually finds happiness. She is
>>an accomplished singer and dancer.>>needed]
>>Count Nikolai Ilyich Rostov ? A
>>hussar, the beloved eldest son
>>of the Rostov family.
>>Sofia Alexandrovna (Sonya) Rostova ? Orphaned
>>cousin of Vera, Nikolai, Natasha
>>and Petya Rostov.
>>Countess Vera Ilyinichna Rostova ? Eldest
>>of the Rostov children, she
>>marries the German career soldier,
>>Berg.
>>Pyotr Ilyich (Petya) Rostov ? Youngest
>>of the Rostov children.
>>Prince Vasily Sergeyevich Kuragin ? A
>>ruthless man who is determined
>>to marry his children well,
>>despite having doubts about the
>>character of some of them.
>>
>>Princess Elena Vasilyevna (H?l?ne) Kuragina ?
>>A beautiful and sexually alluring
>>woman who has many affairs,
>>including (it is rumoured) with
>>her brother Anatole
>>Prince Anatol Vasilyevich Kuragin ? H?l?ne's
>>brother and a very handsome,
>>ruthless and amoral pleasure seeker
>>who is secretly married yet
>>tries to elope with Natasha
>>Rostova.
>>Prince Ipolit Vasilyevich ? The eldest
>>and perhaps most dim-witted of
>>the Kuragin children.
>>Prince Boris Drubetskoy ? A poor
>>but aristocratic young man who
>>is determined to make his
>>career, even at the expense
>>of his friends and benefactors,
>>marries a rich and ugly
>>woman to help him climb
>>the social ladder.
>>Princess Anna Mikhailovna Drubetskoya ? The
>>mother of Boris.
>>Fyodor Ivanovich Dolokhov ? A cold,
>>almost psychopathic officer, he ruins
>>Nikolai Rostov after his proposal
>>to Sonya is refused, he
>>only shows love to his
>>doting mother.
>>Adolf Karlovich Berg ? A young
>>Russian officer, who desires to
>>be just like everyone else.
>>
>>Anna Pavlovna Sherer ? Also known
>>as Annette, she is the
>>hostess of the salon that
>>is the site of much
>>of the novel's action in
>>Petersburg.
>>Maria Dmitryevna Akhrosimova ? An older
>>Moscow society lady, she is
>>an elegant dancer and trend-setter,
>>despite her age and size.
>>
>>Amalia Evgenyevna Bourienne ? A French
>>woman who lives with the
>>Bolkonskys, primarily as Princess Marya's
>>companion.
>>Vasily Dmitrich Denisov ? Nikolai Rostov's
>>friend and brother officer, who
>>proposes to Natasha.
>>Platon Krataev - The archetypal good
>>Russian peasant, whom Pierre meets
>>in the prisoner of war
>>camp.
>>Napoleon I of France ? the
>>Great Man, whose fate is
>>detailed in the book.
>>General Mikhail Ilarionovich Kutuzov ? Russian
>>commander-in-chief throughout the book. His
>>diligence and modesty eventually save
>>Russia from Napoleon.
>>Osip Bazdeyev ? the Freemason who
>>interests Pierre in his mysterious
>>group, starting a lengthy subplot.>>needed]
>>Tsar Alexander I of Russia ?
>>He signed a peace treaty
>>with Napoleon in 1807 and
>>then went to war with
>>him.
>>Many of Tolstoy's characters in War
>>and Peace were based on
>>real-life people known to Tolstoy
>>himself. His grandparents and their
>>friends were the models for
>>many of the main characters,
>>his great-grandparents would have been
>>of the generation of Prince
>>Vasilly or Count Ilya Rostov.
>>Some of the characters, obviously,
>>are actual historic figures.
>>
>> Adaptations
>> Film
>>The first Russian film adaptation of
>>War and Peace was the
>>1915 film Война и мир
>>(Voyna i mir), directed by
>>Vladimir Gardin and starring Gardin
>>and the Russian ballerina Vera
>>Karalli. It was followed in
>>1968 by the critically acclaimed
>>four-part film version War and
>>Peace, by the Soviet director
>>Sergei Bondarchuk, released individually in
>>1965-1967, and as a re-edited
>>whole in 1968. This starred
>>Lyudmila Savelyeva (as Natasha Rostova)
>>and Vyacheslav Tikhonov (as Andrei
>>Bolkonsky). Bondarchuk himself played the
>>character of Pierre Bezukhov. The
>>film was almost seven hours
>>long; it involved thousands of
>>actors, 120 000 extras, and
>>it took seven years to
>>finish the shooting, as a
>>result of which the actors
>>age changed dramatically from scene
>>to scene. It won an
>>Oscar for Best Foreign Language
>>Film for its authenticity and
>>massive scale. <2>
>>
>>The novel has been adapted twice
>>for cinema outside of Russia.
>>The first of these was
>>produced by F. Kamei in
>>Japan (1947). The second was
>>the 208-minute long 1956 War
>>and Peace, directed by the
>>American King Vidor. This starred
>>Audrey Hepburn (Natasha), Henry Fonda
>>(Pierre) and Mel Ferrer (Andrei).
>>Audrey Hepburn was nominated for
>>a BAFTA Award for best
>>British actress and for a
>>Golden Globe Award for best
>>actress in a drama production.
>>
>>
>> Opera
>>Initiated by a proposal of the
>>German director Erwin Piscator in
>>1938, the Russian composer Sergei
>>Prokofiev composed his opera War
>>and Peace based on this
>>epic novel during the 1940s.
>>The complete musical work premiered
>>in Leningrad in 1955. It
>>was the first opera to
>>be given a public performance
>>at the Sydney Opera House
>>(1973).<19>
>> Music
>>War and Peace (Op. 91) (Russian:
>>Война и мир, Voyna i
>>mir) is an opera by
>>Sergei Prokofiev, with a libretto
>>by Mira Mendelson, and is
>>based on the novel.
>>Composition by Nino Rota <3>
>>Referring to album notes on http://www.yesworld.com/,
>>the first track "The Gates
>>of Delirium", from the album
>>Relayer, by the progressive rock
>>group Yes, is said to
>>be based loosely on the
>>novel.
>> Theatre
>>The first successful stage adaptations of
>>War and Peace were produced
>>by Alfred Neumann and Erwin
>>Piscator (1942, revised 1955, published
>>by Macgibbon & Kee in
>>London 1963, and staged in
>>16 countries since) and R.
>>Lucas (1943).
>>
>>A stage adaptation by Helen Edmundson,
>>first produced in 1996 at
>>the Royal National Theatre, was
>>published that year by Nick
>>Hern Books, London. Edmundson added
>>to and amended the play<4>
>>for a 2008 production as
>>two 3-hour parts by Shared
>>Experience, directed by Nancy Meckler
>>and Polly Teale.<5> This was
>>first put on at the
>>Nottingham Playhouse, then toured in
>>the UK to Liverpool, Darlington,
>>Bath, Warwick, Oxford, Truro, London
>>(the Hampstead Theatre) and Cheltenham.
>>
>>
>>On the 15th-18th july, The Birmingham
>>Theatre School performed this 7
>>hour epic play at The
>>Crescent Theatre in Brindleyplace with
>>great success. Birmingham Theatre School
>>is the only drama school
>>in the world to perform
>>the new adaptation of War
>>and Peace. Directed by Chris
>>Rozanski and Assistant to Director
>>was Royal National Theatre performer
>>Anthony Mark Barrow with Vocals
>>arranged by Dr Ria Keen
>>and choreography by Colin Lang.
>>
>>
>> Radio and television
>>In December 1970, Pacifica Radio station
>>WBAI broadcast a reading of
>>the entire novel (the 1968
>>Dunnigan translation) read by over
>>140 celebrities and ordinary people.
>><6>
>>War and Peace (1972): The BBC
>>(British Broadcasting Corporation) made a
>>television serial based on the
>>novel, broadcast in 1972-73. Anthony
>>Hopkins played the lead role
>>of Pierre. Other lead characters
>>were played by Rupert Davies,
>>Faith Brook, Morag Hood, Alan
>>Dobie, Angela Down and Sylvester
>>Morand. This version faithfully included
>>many of Tolstoy's minor characters,
>>including Platon Karataev (Harry Locke).
>><7>, <8>
>>A dramatized full-cast adaptation in ten
>>parts was written by Marcy
>>Kahan and Mike Walker in
>>1997. The production won the
>>1998 Talkie award for Best
>>Drama and was around 9.5
>>hours in length. It was
>>directed by Janet Whitaker and
>>featured Simon Russell Beale, Gerard
>>Murphy, Richard Johnson, and others.<20>
>>
>>La Guerre et la paix (TV)
>>(2000) by Fran?ois Roussillon. Robert
>>Brubaker played the lead role
>>of Pierre.<9>
>>War and Peace (2007): produced by
>>the Italian Lux Vide, a
>>TV mini-series in Russian &
>>English co-produced in Russia, France,
>>Germany, Poland and Italy. Directed
>>by Robert Dornhelm, with screenplay
>>written by Lorenzo Favella, Enrico
>>Medioli and Gavin Scott. It
>>features an international cast with
>>Alexander Beyer playing the lead
>>role of Pierre assisted by
>>Malcolm McDowell, Cl?mence Po?sy, Alessio
>>Boni, Pilar Abella, J. Kimo
>>Arbas, Ken Duken, Juozapas Bagdonas
>>and Toni Bertorelli.<10>
>> Full translations into English
>>Clara Bell (from a French version)
>>1885-86
>>W. H. Dole 1889
>>Leo Wiener 1904
>>Constance Garnett (1904)
>>Louise and Aylmer Maude (1922-3)
>>Rosemary Edmonds (1957, revised 1978)
>>Ann Dunnigan (1968)
>>Anthony Briggs (2005)
>>Andrew Bromfield (2007), translation of the
>>first completed draft, approx. 400
>>pages shorter than other English
>>translations.<3>
>>Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (2007)
>>
>> See also
>>List of characters in War and
>>Peace
>>List of historical novels
>>Natasha's Dance by Orlando Figes, a
>>cultural history of Russia using
>>the name of the main
>>female character <11>
>> References
>>^ Moser, Charles. 1992. Encyclopedia of
>>Russian Literature. Cambridge University Press.
>>Pp. 298?300.; Thirwell, Adam. 2005.
>>"A masterpiece in miniature." London:
>>Guardian UK, October 8; Briggs,
>>Anthony. 2005. "Introduction" to War
>>and Peace. Penguin Classics.
>>^ Knowles, A.V. Leo Tolstoy, Routledge
>>1997.
>>^ Newsweek's Top 100 Books: The
>>Meta-List, retrieved on 07 July
>>2009
>>^ "Introduction?". War and Peace. Wordsworth
>>Editions. 1993. http://books.google.com/books?id=c4...mcH3Cw&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=3&ct=result. Retrieved 2009-03-24.
>>
>>^ Feuer, Kathryn.
>>^ Emerson, Caryl. 1985. "The Tolstoy
>>Connection in Bakhtin", in PMLA,
>>Vol 100, No 1, pp.
>>69-71. Modern Language Association.
>>^ Emerson, Caryl. 1985. Ibid, p.
>>68-69
>>^ Feuer, Kathryn B. 1996
>>^ Pearson and Volokhonsky op cit.
>>
>>^ cf. Knowles 1997, Feuer 1996
>>
>>^ Feuer 1996
>>^ "Introduction to War and Peace"
>>by Richard Peaver in Peaver,
>>Richard and Larissa Volokhonsky, War
>>and Peace, 2008, Vintage Classics.
>>
>>^ Greenwood, Edward Baker (1980). "What
>>is War and Peace?". Tolstoy:
>>The Comprehensive Vision. London: Taylor
>>& Francis. p. 83. ISBN
>>0416741304. http://books.google.com/books?id=ta...tcover&hl=ru&source=gbs_summary_r&cad&pg=PA83.
>>^ Figes, O, Tolstoy's Real Hero.
>>NYRB 22 Nov 2007,pp 4-7.
>>
>>^ a b Figes O (November
>>22, 2007). "Tolstoy?s Real Hero".
>>The New York Review of
>>Books, Volume 54, Number 18.
>>
>>^ Feuer, Kathryn B. Tolstoy and
>>the Genesis of War and
>>Peace, Cornell University Press, 1996
>>(First Edition)
>>^ Troyat, Henri. Tolstoy, a biography.
>>Doubleday, 1967.
>>^ <1>
>>^ Sydney Opera House: History -
>>highlights
>>^ "Marcy Kahan Radio Plays". War
>>And Peace (Radio Dramatization). http://web.ukonline.co.uk/suttonelms/mkahan.html.
>>Retrieved 2010-01-20.
>> External links
>> Wikisource has original text related
>>to this article:
>>War and Peace
>>English translation at gutenberg
>>Searchable version of the gutenberg text
>>in multiple formats SiSU
>>War and Peace, complete text with
>>accompanying audio.
>>Full text of War and Peace
>>in modern Russian orthography
>>An audio version of Book 1
>>of War and Peace (other
>>books are available through links).
>>
>>A searchable online version of Aylmer
>>Maude's English translation of War
>>and Peace
>>SparkNotes Study Guide for "War and
>>Peace"
>>Birth, death, balls and battles by
>>Orlando Figes. This is an
>>edited version of an essay
>>found in the Penguin Classics
>>new translation of War and
>>Peace (2005).
>>Homage to War and Peace Searchable
>>map, compiled by Nicholas Jenkins,
>>of places named in Tolstoy's
>>novel (2008).
>>Russian Army during the Napoleonic Wars
>>
>>The War and Peace Broadcast: 35th
>>Anniversary, from Pacifica Radio Archives
>>site
>>War and Peace at the Internet
>>Book List
>>Radio documentary about 1970 marathon reading
>>of War and Peace on
>>WBAI, from Democracy Now! program,
>>December 6, 2005
>>Disscusion-Forum at Reading Group Guides
>
>Thanks Nv......Ha!
>
>Robb
Onedryboot, I had no idea until now either...
NVB, nice signature!!

~Z~


>Excessive band width
>
fat_man_band.jpg>


>I dont know what to say....but I just teared up from laughing >so hard!! Holy Shiz! even though this thread is extremely >random, I just found it very entertaining!!LMAO!! Bess I feel >sorry for you from the standpoint of NV rubbing this in your >face Damn boys this just made my day.

>Good GAWD NVB!
>And I get accused of excessive bandwidth use?

>mother of goddddddddd LOLOLOLOLOL

Great posts, thanks for sharing!
 
took me 4 hours to read that long ass post, well not really But that was a heck of a copy and paste job. LOL


"I have found if you go the extra mile it's Never crowded".
 
Only problem with reply with quote is if you use it on a post in the middle of the thread then it submits it right below the post you are quoting instead of at the bottom as the last post. Then most people who have been following the thread completely miss the new post.
 
>Only problem with reply with quote
>is if you use it
>on a post in the
>middle of the thread then
>it submits it right below
>the post you are quoting
>instead of at the bottom
>as the last post.
>Then most people who have
>been following the thread completely
>miss the new post.


:)

Which is often a waste of good sarcasm and satire if no one sees it and nothing pisses me off more than that.
 
>>Only problem with reply with quote
>>is if you use it
>>on a post in the
>>middle of the thread then
>>it submits it right below
>>the post you are quoting
>>instead of at the bottom
>>as the last post.
>>Then most people who have
>>been following the thread completely
>>miss the new post.
>
>
>:)
>
>Which is often a waste of
>good sarcasm and satire if
>no one sees it and
>nothing pisses me off more
>than that.


Word.
 
>>>Only problem with reply with quote
>>>is if you use it
>>>on a post in the
>>>middle of the thread then
>>>it submits it right below
>>>the post you are quoting
>>>instead of at the bottom
>>>as the last post.
>>>Then most people who have
>>>been following the thread completely
>>>miss the new post.
>>
>>
>>:)
>>
>>Which is often a waste of
>>good sarcasm and satire if
>>no one sees it and
>>nothing pisses me off more
>>than that.
>
>
>Word.


I actually read that POS book in Russian Lit Class @ Arizona. Pretty good book actually! :)

Joey
 
>>>>Only problem with reply with quote
>>>>is if you use it
>>>>on a post in the
>>>>middle of the thread then
>>>>it submits it right below
>>>>the post you are quoting
>>>>instead of at the bottom
>>>>as the last post.
>>>>Then most people who have
>>>>been following the thread completely
>>>>miss the new post.
>>>
>>>
>>>:)
>>>
>>>Which is often a waste of
>>>good sarcasm and satire if
>>>no one sees it and
>>>nothing pisses me off more
>>>than that.
>>
>>
>>Word.
>
>
>I actually read that POS book
>in Russian Lit Class @
>Arizona. Pretty good book actually!
>:)
>
>Joey

Word

~Z~
 
That's funny stuff right here!! I've never used it and all I see as I type right now are the lines going down and down and down and down and down and down and down. When I type all the letters that are to the right of what I'm typing go down and continue to move as I type with my fingers tha are attached to my hands which are attached to my arms and the letters keep moving down and down and down and down.......>>>>>Only problem with reply with quote
>>>>>is if you use it
>>>>>on a post in the
>>>>>middle of the thread then
>>>>>it submits it right below
>>>>>the post you are quoting
>>>>>instead of at the bottom
>>>>>as the last post.
>>>>>Then most people who have
>>>>>been following the thread completely
>>>>>miss the new post.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>:)
>>>>
>>>>Which is often a waste of
>>>>good sarcasm and satire if
>>>>no one sees it and
>>>>nothing pisses me off more
>>>>than that.
>>>
>>>
>>>Word.
>>
>>
>>I actually read that POS book
>>in Russian Lit Class @
>>Arizona. Pretty good book actually!
>>:)
>>
>>Joey
>
>Word
>
>~Z~
 
>That's funny stuff right here!! I've never used it and all I see as I type right now are the lines going down and down and down and down and down and down and down. When I type all the letters that are to the right of what I'm typing go down and continue to move as I type with my fingers tha are attached to my hands which are attached to my arms and the letters keep moving down and down and down and down.......>>>>>Only problem with reply with quote
>>>>>>is if you use it
>>>>>>on a post in the
>>>>>>middle of the thread then
>>>>>>it submits it right below
>>>>>>the post you are quoting
>>>>>>instead of at the bottom
>>>>>>as the last post.
>>>>>>Then most people who have
>>>>>>been following the thread completely
>>>>>>miss the new post.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>:)
>>>>>
>>>>>Which is often a waste of
>>>>>good sarcasm and satire if
>>>>>no one sees it and
>>>>>nothing pisses me off more
>>>>>than that.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Word.
>>>
>>>
>>>I actually read that POS book
>>>in Russian Lit Class @
>>>Arizona. Pretty good book actually!
>>>:)
>>>
>>>Joey
>>
>>Word
>>
>>~Z~



lol
 

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