War and Peace (Vintage Classics)

For non Russian readers, the question is not whether one should read War and Peace, rather what translation to read. After some quick research on the internet, I settled for the Anthony Briggs’ translation. May be I was also biased by the fact that it was a Penguin publication, as I have been used to Penguin paperbacks since childhood. To say the least, I was not disappointed at all. The prose is easy flowing yet powerful, the style very soothing. I never felt that I was reading a translation.The only aspects that remind you that you are reading a Russian novel are the names of characters and places. Otherwise it is as English as the British can be :) The book has a very helpful ‘Appendix’ with a summary of each chapter, succinctly delivered as ‘points’. One appreciates this when one reads this 1358 page book over a period of time and needs to refresh one’s memory before embarking upon the next ‘sitting’ to read. A nicely indexed bibliography, helps the reader fully understand the historical contexts, so much necessary in this novel which is partially based on real events and real characters. Finally, there is a helpful ‘Characters’ section,which I did not notice till I had completed the book. This lists the plethora of characters that dot the story’s landscape. Many characters share same last names and above all Tolstoy tends to refer to the same person , sometimes by first name, sometimes by the last , sometimes by his/her ‘pet’ name! If you are the technical type, there are a couple of maps as well but I followed the famous graphic by the French civil engineer Charles Joseph Minard, that I already had got as a poster https://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/posters If I have to raise one minor grievance on the translation, it is that there is an overuse of words like sardonic, pallid, lugubrious, desultory. Perhaps these are Mr. Briggs favorite words or maybe they are equivalents of some stock Russian words that Tolstoy himself used in the original. War and Peace has been considered the greatest novel ever written and seems this is not without reason. To praise it would be to state the obvious. Orlando Figes’ concludes in his short and nice introduction, ‘Above all War and Peace will move readers by virtue of its beauty as a work of art. It is a triumphant affirmation of human life in all its richness and complexity…’. It is perhaps appropriate to share one’s experiences in the course of reading this epic I experienced joy and ecstasy like no other. Joy of reading at its best. No Disney or Spielberg movie have given me this level of enjoyment and may I say exhilaration. It was so personal. I lived through the characters, imbibed the flavor of the times, entered the battle grounds, rode the thoroughbred horses, strode through the vestibules of stately mansions, smelt the perfumes wafting through manors, sat in their drawing rooms, drank in the bars, donned their costumes, suffered bodily injury and pain and even knew what it was like to die. I was awe struck at the range of emotions that a single person is capable of going through over a period, however never doubting that this was impossible, never seeing unreal.Every human emotion/experience that one can think of is represented in the pantheon of characters that appear in this epic. It is to Tolstoy’s credit that he has so beautifully portrayed perhaps every conceivable emotion in human relationships. Curiosity,infatuation,adolescent love, passion, closeness, pure and true love - all come into play. Characters serve up abundantly the very humane qualities of wisdom, bravery, patriotism, loyalty, intrigue,treachery, self doubt, righteous indignation, piety, innocence, vanity, pride and many many more. War and Peace is also philosophical, with characters ruminating on life’s purpose and God. A young lady of pious character beautifully enunciates the principles of Christianity, albeit in a subtle way, without the reader getting the slightest hint that it is a digression. As somebody said, it should perhaps have been named ‘Peace and War‘ because Tolstoy devotes the initial part of the book to the halcyon days enjoyed by Russian aristocracy set in villas amidst placid surroundings. The Napoleonic war sets in later and when it does, it gradually upends the lives of the main protagonists. To Tolstoy’s credit, he deftly marries these two worlds and the story meanders through with twists and turns, the war sucking in everybody in its wake, a war that also brings the main characters to the front lines. The novel dwells at length on all that is there to a war - strategies, commandeering armies, the accompanying treachery, mortalities on the field, suffering and what not. Napoleon’s famous but disastrous march to Moscow and the retreat that followed has been gone through with a fine toothed comb. At times the novel sounds more like a historical account, especially when Tolstoy seems to take a step back and starts offering his own analysis on why somebody did what they did in the war and not something else. In doing so, Tolstoy rips apart earlier historians of his period, both French and Russian, questioning their proclivity to explain happenings as the result of conscious moves made by the “great” Napoleon on the French side or efforts by able generals on the Russian end. He goes into a detailed analysis on reasons for the Russian retreat in the face of the advancing French while also exposing how uncoordinated the Russian generals were to deal a concerted onslaught. He also tries to set right the unfavorable treatment meted out by historians to General Kutuzov of the Russian Army by highlighting his wisdom and farsightedness in refusing to be drawn into battles with the French during their retreat when there were apparently grounds for doing so. Tolstoy seems to reserve choice criticisms for Napoleon and makes no secret of his opinion that the general was overrated. The epilogue stretches too long (100 pages) and is a laborious monologue of Tolstoy’s own theories about history and how historical biographies should be written, etc.The author repeats himself many times in the course of the epilogue as well as in the main part of the book by espousing his own theories on how war histories should be written.He even ventures into philosophy and jurisprudence. If not for the fact that a small portion of the epilogue is tied to the story, the reader could have safely skipped this portion. (If you plan to read the book you can skip the following) Last but not least, like any reader who broods over something that has been so engaging and rewarding, I thought about the novel’s purpose. Was there a message? I am not sure whether Tolstoy intended to, but I clearly saw a message delivered at two levels - human being and humanity as a whole.. At the human level, the novel shows that good prevails over evil by way of rewarding people who are intrinsically good (Marie/Princess Marya and Pierre) or people who redeem themselves (Natasha). At the level of humanity, it shows the frivolity of war, by exposing how in the final analysis the war did not achieve any purpose other than suffering and death.

I have, at various times, tried to read four different editions of War & Peace (Penguin, Signet, Barnes & Noble, and now this) and by far, this (the Pevear and Volokhonsky translation from Vintage Classics) is the best edition I've seen. This edition is everything I was looking for in a copy of War & Peace and I cannot recommend it highly enough. This is the edition of War & Peace I finished, and it bound to become the standard for the foreseeable future. Pros: It is highly readable. Translating texts is always difficult, because you want to retain the feel of reading a Nineteenth century work but use language that makes the work accessible. Personally, I found some editions (Barnes & Noble, Penguin) to be hard to read and comprehend, especially when you first begin. This edition is a relative breeze to read. It has French translations. When reading the Signet edition, I found myself using google translate to understand sentences or phrases left in the book in French. Other editions translated most of the French but left phrases here and there untranslated and in the text, without footnotes. I understand in the original, Tolstoy wrote entire passages in French but provided translations in the foot notes. This edition follows that pattern. There are entire passages in French, but they are translated in the footnotes on the page. It has historical end-notes and an index. I am not unfamiliar with European and Russian history, but I, like most people, have no more knowledge than what I learned in my freshman world history class. This work has end notes in the text to provide context. Though it slows me down, I find myself flipping to the back of the book and reading every end note when the text provides it. I cannot stress enough how helpful this has been. The index is likewise helpful. It is an alphabetical list and short biography of the historical characters and places mentioned in War and Peace. It includes a short chapter summary. At the very end of the book, there is a chapter summary for a collection of chapters sharing a theme or describing the same event. The summary is no more than a sentence long and provides a nice refresher when you are trying to recall what happened when. Cons: Compared to editions that translate all the French, reading in the footnotes can be burdensome. I personally don't mind, but I can see how that might trip some people up. If you are looking for a copy of War and Peace, this is the one to get. Trust me.

It is unlikely that anyone who has the endurance to finish this book would give it a poor review. That would still be true, however, if it were one-third the length. It is, if not the best novel ever written, certainly on a very short list of great works of literature. The beauty of the prose, for me, is the fact that Tolstoy speaks through subtlety. His powers of description are beyond comparison, and in fact there is relatively little dialogue given the length of the book. But the focus of his descriptive powers is not the scenery or the landscape, as is often the case, but the gesture, the look on the face, the social context of the event. This is a subtlety that is lost in our dialogue-heavy, action-packed world today, and is almost foreign to most contemporary authors. Which, in part, also explains why War and Peace seems inapproachable to many contemporary readers. Many of us have lost touch with subtlety and if you are one of those, reading this book would be the greatest gift you can give yourself in the months ahead. “Helene was so good-looking that there was not only not a trace of coquetry to be seen in her, but, on the contrary, it was as if she was embarrassed by her unquestionable and all too strongly and triumphantly effective beauty. It was as if she wished but was unable to diminish the effect of her beauty.” When was the last time you read such a descriptive passage that used so few descriptive adjectives? One of the common criticisms of the book is that the characters often speak in French, which is retained in this translation. This is more true in the beginning, however, and, in total, the French represents a small portion of the total prose. And translation is provided, although the electronic version requires a certain amount of digital (as in fingers) dexterity that I don’t seem to have. Tolstoy, however, is sensitive to the inconvenience and I can’t recall a single passage in which the French was central to either the theme or the storyline. It is mostly there for context, so even if you pass over the short phrases you will miss little other than the full experience that Tolstoy intended. Also remember that French and English are not all that foreign to each other and the most important words in French can be easily guessed by English readers with a little lingual abandonment. Similarly, the complexity of Russian naming conventions need not be the burden it often is to the English reader. Tolstoy most definitely wrote a novel, not a mystery thriller, although he claims that it is not a novel. The storyline is not the book; it serves the theme. That, along with the rich context provided by Tolstoy’s prose, means that you don’t have to recognize each name before you complete the sentence. Nine times out of ten the identity will become obvious before the scene ends. And for that exception there is a handy reference guide. My advice: when you encounter a name that you don’t immediately recognize, read on for a bit before you look it up. As a thematic novel, it is not Tolstoy’s intent to document the Napoleonic wars, although that is the rough timeline of the book. He uses the history more to reveal the cultural themes he seeks to reveal—the culture of the Russian aristocracy at the time. While that culture contrasts sharply with the way in which most Americans are inclined to think of Russia, the themes are quite timeless. There are many passages which could as easily be describing today’s aristocracy—the wealthy elite. As Yogi Berra reminded us, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” Tolstoy is particularly philosophical about war. When I asked a friend of mine who was a Marine veteran who served in the jungles of Vietnam what he thought about the movie, “Saving Private Ryan”, he noted that no one has ever been able to capture the sheer chaos of war on film. Tolstoy, however, does capture it in prose and it is moving without being graphic or overly detailed. You nonetheless feel that you are immersed in the same situational context as the young infantryman thrown about in the chaos of futility and death. In the end, this book easily earns its reputation as one of the best novels ever written. Through his grasp of subtlety and his incomparable ability to build intangible impressions with tangible prose, Tolstoy takes us through the full range of human emotions, accomplishment, and vacuity. Unlike most contemporary authors, Tolstoy actually “tells” us little. As many great novels do, he merely puts themes out there for us to consider and mold to our own experience and our own lives. You will be surprised at how much of yourself you find in early 19th Century Russian characters and events. If not timeless, the insight and the human revelation are universal. As Tolstoy himself wrote, “We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom.” Indeed!

Reader: You're not really going to die on that hill, are you? P&V: Hold our croissant. The P&V is the most imposing, and probably the most interesting translation to consider carefully or to teach. They have a real way of freshening and enstranging the encounter with the book and the author. That said, my concern is that the love of life in the book, the zest of reading and experiencing the story, suffers some in the name of fidelity. Note: this edition also uses little symbols instead of numbers for its French translation footnote system. This may seem like a silly point, but I never warmed up to this practice. Also, in the translations, P&V only translate the French, so if a passage is a mix of French and Russian, you not only need to look down for the French, but then back up for the English, then back down... are you going to need a chiropractor? I can't answer that question.... All said, these two have been attacked unfairly, and this is a very potent and illuminating translation, even when strong reservations are brought against it. Given the Cadillac nature of this edition, I can't figure why some maps aren't included, memo to vintage for the next version. Now the Maudes... the new edition, edited by Amy Mandelker for Oxford World Classics, really challenges P&V seriously. She puts the French back in, but more importantly uses a footnoting system with numbers and then gives you the whole passage in the note. This may seem like a small difference, but it made a big difference in reading for me. Also, the book is just smartly done for readers and teachers overall. Maps up front, characters up front, non-annoying footnote system to deal with the whole "French thing," and good notes in the back that are helpful for understanding and experiencing the story, ex: the first long note on Napoleon and the rest. Mandelker also tweaks this beloved translation where it needs some correction and updating. Overall, she has done readers a real service in preparing this edition. Also, it's physically nice to hold and read, no small thing; the P&V suffers from its gigantic size and its paper quality. Finally, there's just something still to be said for the closeness of the Maudes to Tolstoy and his own lifetime, mind, and culture. The older Tolstoy remarked when one of his stories was read aloud, "the old man wrote it well" -- well, the same can be said of the Maudes as translators. It's no small thing to help a century of readers fall in love with the longest book they've ever considered reading. Mandelker's new edition preserves the grace, intelligence, and moving power of this older translation, while improving it in respectful but real ways. Finally, on falling in love with books, there's Briggs. He is remarkably engaging and enjoyable. In fact, he's quite funny. He candidly embraces the "cavalier" school of translation, a cosmic alternative to the P&V approach. Some benefits to his edition and approach: he ditches the French so that there are fewer obstacles between readers and the story (as Tolstoy himself did in the 1870s edition, before it was added back later). Briggs also understands and loves what makes this novel -- or whatever it is -- Tolstoy's happiest and greatest work (sorry, Anna K nation). Casually, I note that many of the reviewers who "fell in love" with this monstrous book did so through this translation, more so than through P&V, on the basis of my unreliable and unscientific analysis. If Briggs would just talk Penguin into italicizing his translation when the speaker uses French, he'd probably run off with the sales victory, no doubt. All that said, his cavalier approach has its fair critics, and sometimes his zest for the colloquial, for dynamic expansions, and for riffing on synonyms rather than following Tolstoy's repetitive original causes problems. So, on these three overall: I'd put Maude/Mandelker in the lead; P&V are indispensable for rereading of key passages; and Briggs in third place, with the full acknowledgment that the guy's got game and in the great race for winning reader's hearts all bets are off here. Whatever you choose and do, *read this story* -- there are few experiences of literature and life in the world like this one. And enjoy a good croissant regardless.

Henry James, not himself known for brevity of written expression, considered War and Peace a “large loose baggy monster, ” but each time I’ve read through Tolstoy’s 1000++ page rendering of the Napoleonic Wars era in Russia I’ve fallen completely under its spell. It’s an immense, sprawling literary adventure and I think this rendition by husband and wife team Richard Pevear (American) and Larissa Volokhonsky (Russian) is particularly good at capturing the nuances and beauty of Tolstoy’s writing. In defending War and Peace against its critics, Tolstoy claimed that it’s not a novel, not an epic poem, and not a historical chronicle, but is instead a convention straddling work of artistic prose whose form was dictated by its subject matter. The book has lots (and lots) of main characters--many of my favorites in literature--and it involves readers deeply, even tenderly, in their lives, loves, hopes, struggles, and spiritual odysseys. There are battles, balls, evening soirees, and family estates ruined then resurrected, but the plot is only part of the story. Also included are philosophical digressions on the truths of life and death, discussions on the forces of history, rants about historians (people who subscribe to the “great man theory” will not find support from Tolstoy), and even a little battlefield algebra--but often these metaphysical excursions are made using capacious poetic metaphors and similes that make reading them a pure pleasure. And did I mention that I love the characters? Though I have nothing against romance novels I never seem to enjoy them, but I swoon over the romances in War and Peace. It’s not a book without flaws. For one thing, now that I’m older, I noticed that in the Epilogue Tolstoy seems to write off people over sixty, and maybe Tolstoy spends too much time away from the plot while propounding his favorite theories. But having finished the book for the fourth time I’m sorry it’s over, and I know that after a few years go by I’ll be happily lost in its pages once more.

GLORIOUS ENGLISH PROSE. Stunning visuals, metaphors, descriptions. War & Peace is simply the greatest novel of all time, one that will touch your soul unforgettably. However this review is about this edition specifically. I wouldn't recommend any other. It reads perfectly, easily, poetically. Even tricky or clunky sentences ARE comprehensible upon first reading 📚. Know what I mean, sentences with several clauses or incidences of "that that" "her her" "of his which had" etc etc. The original French in the book (there is a lot) is very stuffy and old fashioned so I (fluent speaker) had to verify with their consistent, accessible, excellent footnote translations frequently. The endnotes are consistent and helpful for Tolstoys cultural and historical references. Basically: I went out of my way to repurchase this exact edition when recommending War and Peace to someone else. For first time readers: Do not be intimidated. Yes, it's 1200 pages. But I swear to God, if this book went on forever, I would keep reading. Every page is a pleasure, for the senses and the soul. (ok maybe not the first 100 pages when u don't know any of the teenagers yet and they're all proclaiming their love for each other at random events). Stick through the first hundred pages. Take notes. Highlight. Sit back. Enjoy. Be transported. Be touched. Laugh frequently. Smile. Sob weeks later, just thinking about the characters. I would reread War and Peace again in a heartbeat. (caveat: personally I luv me some napoleonic wars history. if u hate history...sorry)

I decided to purchase Pevear and Volokhonsky translation because of the great reviews which convinced me I have to read this classic in the new translation that many claim to be a definitive translation of War and Peace. It sat on the bookshelf for several months. But when I suddenly found the time to read it ... wow it is in French? I have read Hadji Murad before and know that Tolstoy sometimes writes in french, which is the language the Russian Aristocracy used to speak. But the amount of le français in War &Peace just blew me away; about 5% of this book is written in French, and that is a lot of French. Previous English translations usually translated everything into English, thus causing a great loss of nuances of Tolstoy's original expressions. Maintaining original French passages is a better approach because it gives readers an access to Tolstoy's original writing. As I was in the mood of polishing my French, I plowed through the book with great interest. All French (and German) passages are given complete translations at the bottom of the page, so it's easy to guess and understand what you don't know. War & Peace is a great classic and it needs no introduction or affirmation from me. For me, this translation gives you a sense of how Russian aristocrats relied on French to communicate just as much as, if not more than, their own language. The French language also gives the reader the awareness of the period of European history on which W&P is based: it is how the French language, the French Revolution and its ideas were affecting every part of the Russian Empire and the minds of the book's main characters. A translation of War and Peace that is missing it's French is a translation that misses Tolstoy. Besides, I've never seen a novel that serves so well as a French reader. One gets the double pleasure of reading a great Russian classic and practicing one's french. It's such a strange combination.

I have started thinking about my review of the book long before I finished it. It seemed a huge responsibility to review such a monumental work. A job that needs a speck of diligence of what Tolstoy has put in his masterpiece. And while thinking of that, I found that the passages I highlighted while reading the book are enough to form a book of themselves, and this is how colossal the book is, and how grand its author is. That is without speaking of the Epilogue, which is a masterpiece on its own, with the fact that the epilogue is split into two parts, one tying all the loose ends in the main novel, and the other being a magnificent philosophical doctrine. And this seems to be a trait of writing in the book. All its chapters, story lines and main pivots are whimsically alternating between deep philosophical debates, meticulous historic criticism and folk story telling. And the fact that Tolstoy could put them all together in such a great way of writing, is enough reason to make the book a masterpiece. Some confusion ensues, though. While I was reading, there could be multiple evidences of ideologies being forced in the book, and then contradicted. I could see hints of misogyny, conservatism and nationalism (especially when speaking of Napoleon), and then these were negated in other parts of the book. Which drove me to believe that Tolstoy was documenting the de facto ideology of the Russian society rather than his own. This was a huge read, that I don't think reading was an easy task. Some scholars say that War and Peace is written as if the world is writing itself, and in that aspect I can relate. It was not an easy feat to go through, yet It has shown me a lot, just like life itself.

War and Peace

the book came in excellent conditions, my daughter is very happy.

Seriously!

I received this expensive book damaged and patched just as if i would not notice it!

Esta edición del clásico de Tolstói es de una calidad y una grandeza solo comparable con el propio contenido de la misma. SI no tenéis un nivel medio-avanzado de inglés puede tener cierta dificultad.