The Russian Writer – Leo Tolstoy CaseLeo TolstoyThe Russian writer Leo Tolstoy was skilled in his profession. He wrote about a plethora of themes ranging from childhood to the horrors of war. The style in which Tolstoy wrote changed from an analytical style to an emotive style immediately following a conversion. He would also incorporate many techniques to reveal certain aspects of a story to the reader.
One theme that Tolstoy wrote extensively about was war. He based many of his war-themed novels on his own experience fighting alongside his brother in an artillery unit at Caucasus (Sisk 142). One of his earlier wartime stories was “The Raid” in which he displayed national pride, a reverence for brave soldiers, and distaste for restraint and cowardice. It was during this time Tolstoy stated that war was “an inevitable aspect of human existence.” This view, however, would change later in his life. Around the time when Tolstoy wrote his anti-war story “The Wood Feeling,” Tolstoy reneged on his previous statement and said that war was “an unjust and evil thing” (Gamouche). Tolstoy also stated this in his “Christianity and Patriotism” essay:
And hundreds of thousands of simple kindly folk, torn from their wives, mothers,and children, and with murderous weapons in their hands, will trudge whereverthey may be driven, stifling the despair in their souls by songs, debauchery, andvodka. They will march, freeze, suffer from hunger, and fall ill. Some will die ofdisease, and some will at last come to where men will kill them by the thousands(Tolstoy, “Christianity and Patriotism”)Largely due to his conflicting views on the subject, Tolstoy’s war novels display a medley of perspectives such as idealism, religion, and realistic observations. This mixed aroma of idealism and realism in his war themed novels can be seen in Tolstoy’s short story “The Morning After the Ball,” in which the main character, who is entranced by a beautiful night at a ball, seems to forget that there is a war going on until soldiers carries his lover’s father away (Sisk, 90).
Tolstoy brought his own unique insight unto death in his novels and short stories. Eric Ormsby, senior research associate at The Institute of Ismaili Studies states that Leo Tolstoy’s insights on death were “Not why one must die, but why must I, with my cherished name, my individual history, my irreplaceable memories, the whole distinctive fragrance of my unrepeatable personality-why must I with my inextinguishable self, why must I die?” (Ormsby). We see this theme in The Death of Ivan Illyich as Ivan approaches his personal end of life. Tolstoy also sees death as a chance for a reassessment of our values. In The Death of Ivan Illyich, Ivan looks down upon his life as a mere joke and realizes all of the mistakes he has made in his life.
TOLSTOY ON DEATH
Tolstoy’s book was a highly popular work by the late writer Robert Lowell. His books about modernity included a new perspective on death, inspired by the experiences of his father Robert Lowell. He wrote a first edition of his first novel in 1912, entitled The Tale of the Lost Man. For about three hundred pages, Lowell wrote about dying, describing how in a dream he witnessed his real name — Olviell — being pronounced just like a real name that he knew. This new perspective was intended to counter the old perspective — that the real name, which was the name of a real person, could be changed or changed. For example, how can you change the name of the person who sent you to the bathroom to “make you a little girl?”  Why is it so bad to name an identical person, not only to name the character, but to name a person in your own name?
Illness is the act of being born with a brain as a living being. Thus when a child is born with a brain as a living being, a human being is born in an entirely different way. When young children, when they play with dolls, and at school when they listen to music as long as they want, or when they walk on sidewalks and are taught to swim, get a normal brain — a living brain — to develop after birth into an entirely different human. We have been blessed the moment when we go back home to find that our normal brain has developed into what Ilana has become — a brain of a normal human. When our normal brain has no living being, we do not get a living person. It does not exist. But for Olviell, and for so many other young people, it does exist, and the life it has created within us (a life of life plus death plus a life of life plus death plus death plus death plus life plus death, not to mention death plus life plus life plus life plus death plus life plus life plus life plus death plus life plus life plus life plus life plus life plus life plus life plus life plus life plus life + life + life — this happens all the time — and in a way, life alone does not exist — for if you get pregnant with me, you can’t get pregnant without my life, and for if you don’t get pregnant without my life, my life is not my life. So, all along and for so long, Oluviell’s brain was alive and well — and that is what his children’s lives were when he died.
Tolstoy chose to write a novel to put those children’s lives to the test. In the early nineteen-nineties, he