The Yale expositor., 1899-05-12

composes, from o'clock in the morn
ing until in the afternoon, and dur
ing these hours he will not permit
himself to be disturbed under any PIE
text. He uses the first pen and sheet
OF paper that comes to hand, no mat
ter what the quality may be, and he
writes very rapidly, about twenty
pages of manuscript being an average
days work. These twenty pages are
then copied by some friend, or by the
Counts wife and daughters. after
which they are placed on his study ia
BILE. There the Count finds them on
the following day. and he then thor
oughly revises them. adding a SEN
tence here, excising a phrase there,
and otherwise shaping the work to
his satisfaction.
This done fresh cory is made. Ac-
cording to Sergheenko, Tolstoi is 50
careful over his manuscript, not be-
cause he desires to make 1t as perfect
as possible in regard to form and Ian
guage, but because he finds that new
ideas come to him after his first rough
draft has been made, and he feels
bound to embody them in his COM
pleted manuscript. In other words,
with Tolstoi the idea is everything
and style or form nothing, or next to
nothing. Izdeed, he complains tina;
the manual task Of writing is detri-
mental to sincerity of thought and ex
vpnccinn anA fhaf This &c tho
why his first drafts are, as a rule, 80
unsatisfactory.
His days work done, he loves to
read aloud to crce Of friends. Aft or
he had written THE Power of Dark
ness he read it to some of his neigh
bors, and derived much profit from
their criticisms and comments His Sc
verest critics is his wife. She expresses
her opinion freely, and, as she is
woman of unusual intelligence, To stoi
values it highly.
The authors famous romance, war
and Peace" says Sergheenko, was at
first intended to be an introduction to
another work OF fiction. which was to
be called THE Decembrists." Ultimate
ly, however, Tolstoi decided not to
write this latter work, as the topic
did not seem to him to be of suffic ent
human interest. On the other hand,
the events of 1905 and the campaign
of 1872 seemed to him of absorbing in
terest, and he spent five years In writ
ing the romance which Is based on
them. BY the way, the manuscript OF
"War and Peace" lay for a long tine
neglected in a drawer, until finally
Count Tolstoi found it and deposited 1t
in the Moscow Museum.
A romance with Peter the Great as
the hero was also planned by Tostol,
but after thorough study of his life
and epoch he found that the subject
was not congenial. Peter the Great
seemed to him an admirable character
In many ways, but he could not wholly
sympathize with him or his plans, and
his fine literary judgment told him
that he could not fitt'ngly portray the
character with whom he was not Who'll
ly in sympathy.
The idea of writing "Anna Kare-
nina" came to Tolstol during a certain
evening in 1873 as he was listening t.
a story in Pushkin, which was being
read aloud by his son. The story was
a simple one, and Tolstoi especially
admired the opening sentences 70.
their simplicity and naturalness
''That is the way one ought to write"
he remarked. you must attract the
readers attention at once II you wish
to retain It," to which some memters
of his family replied that 1t would be
well for him to set the example him
self by writing a simple modern ro-
nance himself That evening, In the
seclusion of his study. Tolstoi wrote
the first chapter OF anna Karenina."