War and Peace :Philosophical chapters

War and Peace

War and Peace (Russian: Война и мир, romanized: Voyna i mir; pre-reform Russian: Война и миръ; [vɐjˈna i ˈmʲir]) is a literary work by the Russian author Leo Tolstoy that mixes fictional narrative with chapters on history and philosophy. It was first published serially, then published in its entirety in 1869. It is regarded as Tolstoy's finest literary achievement and remains an internationally praised classic of world literature.

 

The novel chronicles the French invasion of Russia and the impact of the Napoleonic era on Tsarist society through the stories of five Russian aristocratic families. Portions of an earlier version, titled The Year 1805, were serialized in The Russian Messenger from 1865 to 1867 before the novel was published in its entirety in 1869.

 

Tolstoy said that the best Russian literature does not conform to standards and hence hesitated to classify War and Peace, saying it is "not a novel, even less is it a poem, and still less a historical chronicle". Large sections, especially the later chapters, are philosophical discussions rather than narrative. He regarded Anna Karenina as his first true novel.

 

Philosophical chapters

War and Peace is Tolstoy's longest work, consisting of 361 chapters. Of those, 24 are philosophical chapters with the author's comments and views, rather than narrative:

• Book 3:

Part 10 - Chapters 19, 20 and 33
Part 11 - Chapter 1

 

• Book 4:

Part 13 - Chapter 8
Part 14 - Chapters 1, 2 and 18

 

 

 

• Epilogue:

Part 1 - Chapters 1 to 4
Part 2

 

Epilogue in two parts

First part

 

Karl Kollmann depicting the Decembrist uprising in St. Petersburg, 1825.

The first part of the epilogue begins with the wedding of Pierre and Natasha in 1813. 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. Although he finds marrying women for money repugnant, Nikolai gives in to his love for Princess Maria and marries her.

Nikolai and Maria then move to her inherited estate of Bald Hills with his mother and Sonya, whom he supports for the rest of their lives. Nikolai and Maria have children together, and 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. Pierre and Natasha visit Bald Hills in 1820. 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).

Second part

The second part of the epilogue contains Tolstoy's critique of all existing forms of mainstream history. The 19th-century Great Man Theory claims that historical events are the result of the actions of "heroes" and other great individuals; Tolstoy argues that this is impossible because of how rarely these actions result in great historical events. Rather, he argues, great historical events are the result of many smaller events driven by the thousands of individuals involved (he compares this to calculus, and the sum of infinitesimals). He then goes on to argue that these smaller events are the result of an inverse relationship between necessity and free will, necessity being based on reason and therefore explicable through historical analysis, and free will being based on consciousness and therefore inherently unpredictable. Tolstoy also ridicules newly emerging Darwinism as overly simplistic, comparing it to plasterers covering over icons with plaster.