num_pages: 926
description: This edition, the famous Constance Garnett translation, has been revised throughout by Leonard J. Kent and Nina Berberova."Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."  So begins Anna Karenina , Leo Tolstoy's great modern novel of an adulterous affair set against the backdrop of Moscow and St. Petersburg high society in the later half of the nineteenth century.  A sophisticated woman who is respectably married to a government bureaucrat, Anna begins a passionate, all-consuming involvement with a rich army officer.  Refusing to conduct a discreet affair, she scandalizes society by abandoning both her husband and her young son for Count Vronsky--with tragic consequences.  Running parallel is the story of the courtship and marriage of Konstantin Levin (the melancholy nobleman who is Tolstoy's stand-in) and Princess Kitty Shcherbatsky.  Levin's spiritual searching and growth reflect the religious ideals that at the time Tolstoy was evolving for himself.  Taken together, the two plots embroider a vast canvas that ultimately encompasses all levels of Russian society.  "Now and then Tolstoy's novel writes its own self, is produced by its matter, but its subject," noted Vladimir Nabokov.  " Anna Karenina is one of the greatest love stories in world literature."  As Matthew Arnold wrote in his celebrated essay on   "We are not to take Anna Karenina as a work of art; we are to take it as a piece of life."  
language: English
title: Anna Karenina
titlecomplete: Anna Karenina
characters: Count Aleksei Kirillovich Vronsky, Prince Stepan "Stiva" Arkadyevitch Oblonsky, Anna Arkadyevna Karenina, Princess Ekaterina "Kitty" Aleksandrovna Shcherbatskaya, Konstantin "Kostya" Dmitrievitch Levin
genres: Fiction, Russian Literature, 19th Century, Classics, Historical, Russia, Historical Fiction, Romance, Literature, Novels
ratings_count: 819237
places: Russia
awards: awardedAt: 1325404800000
name: Premio literatura rusa en España, awardedAt: 1325404800000
name: Read Russia Prize
category: Classic Russian Literature for Victor Gallego Ballestero
publisher: Modern Library