War and Peace (Oxford World's Classics) | Leo Tolstoy | Consuming, and the Oxford edition is...

War and Peace (Oxford World's Classics) | Leo Tolstoy | One of the most fantastic books I've read

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War and Peace (Oxf...

	War and Peace (Oxford World's Classics) Leo Tolstoy Oxford University Press, USA, 1998 - 1392 pages average customer review:based on 287 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Consuming, and the Oxford edition is excellent

I'll admit that I only read this so that I could honestly tell people I've read it. And yet it was extraordinary, the greatest novel I've ever read. As the spotlight reviewer says, it's long because it covers everything. Tolstoy surprises, reassures, and consumes at the turn of every page. He knows me. He knows my life. He knows how I will turn out and how my life will turn out. His characters are all so alive and realistic that when a knock on the door interrupts my reading and I go to answer it, I expect Prince Andrei standing on the other side. You'd think that it would be hard to get into the head of a Russian cavalry lieutenant from two centuries ago - the equivalent of my great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather - via the imagination of a Russian aristocrat who is the equivalent of my great-great-great-grandfather. But no. Tolstoy makes them feel like my friends. He describes war as the utterly confused and perpetually unjust mess that it must surely be (like the WWI poets), and covers so many other themes that it would take a work almost as long as W&P to do them any justice.

Especially when taken with Anna Karenina, which is almost as impressive and somewhat more coherent as a single story, Tolstoy seems more like the omniscient god of mankind's imagination to me than any religious "God" does. Bravo.

PS: The Oxford World Classic edition is great. The translation by Aylmer and Louise Maude was approved by Tolstoy himself and is never stilted - it hasn't even aged greatly. There are a handful of helpful maps, a list of characters, and a timeline. The typeface is easy to read and by no means small. The inner margin is wide, meaning that the words never run too close into the spine, which is itself quite strong. The endnotes are helpful and thankfully referenced by page number, thus not being difficult to find, unlike the accursed numbers-arranged-by-chapter format. The only drawback is the weight: one-handed reading will be uncomfortable for some, but on the whole I think the ever-so-slightly heavier paper will be appreciated. The price is certainly a bonus. For the record, this is the only classic which I bought and read straight away, right the way through on the first go!

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One of the most fantastic books I've read

In college I was given one week to read "War & Peace." Of course I never got through it, but in the manymoves around the world that I've made I have carried that book with me thinking someday to read it. I thought it would be difficult to read, not only because of the Russian names but of the time in which it was written. I read Constance Garnett's translation, the only one available in my 50 year old book. I was delighted with how easy it is to read. I'm amazed to find it was a page turner. One of the few classics that's really readable. Tolstoy was a psychologist long before Freud/Jung. His insight into people is fabulous. I, who hate war and violence, thought his war scenes amazing. I read them all. I enjoyed his philosophizing about life that had little to do with the story line. Actually, I have to say I was thrilled with this book and sorry it took me 50 years to get around to reading it. It's truly a masterpiece, an enjoyable, readable, delightful one.

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go ahead and read the thing.

sure it's long and full of russian names, but it really isn't that daunting once you dig in. this is one of the first books i read (about 24 years ago), and it was the one that made me a lifelong reader. this is the kind of reading that transports you to another time and place with complete authority & perfection. complex, realistic characters in a strange, cold distant time and place, are what captured me most. Dostoevsky is 2nd rate to Tolstoy in my mental world. This is THE work to read by the master of the novel. so go ahead and read the thing. Your life will be lesser for it if you don't.

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One of the greatest novels ever written

Leo Tolstoy's "War and Peace" (this version) is almost 1500 pages long. To try to review this in any detail would be futile. The book, simply, covers so much territory that it might be better to take a different approach. Following, then, is something like a set of random observations.

For most intellectual males, the key character here is Pyotr/Pierre Bezukhov. Many (including me) see him as a person who is trying desperately to understand what values ought to guide one's life. He tries debauchery, philosophy, the simple perspective of Platon. In the end, Platon's grounded perspective plus his love for Natalie (Natasha) Rostova gives his life meaning. Who cannot feel the pathos/depth of Pierre's statement to Natasha (page 725): "If I were not myself, but were the handsomest, cleverest, best man in the world, and were free, I would be on my knees this minute asking for your hand and for your love."

Other events. There is a wonderfully graphic description of the devastating defeat of the combined Austrian-Russian forces at Austerlitz, the greatest victory of Napoleon. The details as described by Tolstoy are impressive. He clearly has his favorites, such as the Russian General Bagration (who was, in reality, superb at Austerlitz). His depiction of the old General Katuzov is also well drawn. Indeed, so, too, is the description of the great battle at Borodino, in which, while the Russians did not prevail, neither, in the long run, did the French.

Pierre tried to do a great deed in Moscow, and failed (there was always a bit of the inept about him in the novel). His travails as a prisoner as the French withdrew in their death march back toward France are well told and poignant. Here, he meets with Platon and develops a more grounded view of values that could guide one's life (Platon, as some have observed, may be a name used to draw a link to Plato, although I am not so sure).

In the end, his love for Natasha gave his life meaning. However, the sweep of this novel is so great that no short review can possibly encapsulate the contents. This is one of those long Russian novels that has to be read to be appreciated (and that includes other of Tolstoy's work as well as the novels of Dostoyevsky).

All in all, despite its sometimes tedious details, its wandering narrative, its too numerous cast of characters , this novel addresses some of the major issues of humans trying to live their lives and make sense of the world around them. One of the genuinely great works of fiction. . . .

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