Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-03-25
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
1. C. M.

TOLsToY: The Inconstant Genius.
Alexander I. Nazaroff. Frederick A.
Stokes Co.
The long quarrel ended in separation,
She, a little over so. He, q shade this
side of 80. outward signs Of the do
mestic rift were many and various.
The taproot of the trouble, however,
was money, main source of every prt-
vate grievance and Of all public con-
Germ.
He said that after q certain date
sales and royalties from his writings
were to "be given in public domain"
since these had been created In behalf
of the people to promote the common
veal.
And she said-no doubt in the famil-
lar daily and nightly iteration Of wom-
en- for the wearing down of their men
that he was bent upon "impoverishtng
his family" That he was sentimental.
impractical, visionary, faithless and 50
on in rich, vituperative, wifely privilege.
IS children and close upon 80 grand
children. Even q great estate would
white to garden patches under the
strain Of an equitable partitioning.
There was no compromise. He went
his way alone and in order to work
unmolested wrote In secret, hiding away
that which he had done. So that after
his death several novels were discovered
and brought into the open. Among
these The Living Corpse" 1.-THE Devil, +"
"Hadji Murad."
BY this time the world had been
greatly stirred by Count Leo Tolstoy.
Even the general public had come to
applaud the genius of the man: War
and Peace" THE Resurrection" Anna
Karenina' were great novels, accepted
as such, read as such pretty much the
world over. A strange man, Russian
nobleman OF curious prepossessionS and
inscriptions. q dangerous man SO many
said. Philosopher, paciflst, human1ta-
rian, mystic, truth prober, faith seeker,
embodying these passions in novels and
polemic attacks upon the social, eco
nomic and political structure Of his own
country and, by implication, of the
world at large. And the man himself
was of a quality to stir deeper curioS-
ity, to waken a more active interest
than even the genius could command.
A great innovator, q jealous reformer,
an apostle of observation-disclosures Of such
originality, OF such bewidertng guSto
of procedure as to aStound even the
most audacious and to bring diSmay to
the more cautious.
For the first time we come by way
of 1.-THE InconStant Genius" upon the
totality of Count Leo Tolstoy. Prior to
this he has appeared in flashes, q sort
of pyrotechnic display of high and
strange activity. In what Is this genius
rooted? Where and when did it first
make its startling appearance? What
Is the source of its blood, the quality
of its upbringing, the impress OF Its
plastic years? What the revealing stages
of this progression? What the harvest
of each of these for the seeding Of the
next growth of so rich a fecundity In
purpose and plan?
Answer to these questions, and others,
lies in Alexander Nazaroff'S re-embodi-
ment of TolStoy---the boy, the man, the
genius of deep and varied substance.
AS biography. this book Is neither OF
the old pattern nor of the new. It Is
not, on the one hand. a time-sequence
of events whose limits are birth and
death, with slight spatter Of ''conclu-
sion" to round the record. Nor is 1t, on
the other, a novel founded upon the
life-material of the person under con-
sideration. Instead, this book Is,
throughout, Leo Tolstoy himself. Some
hour, some day, some year, some phase
of Tolstoy is delivered by the man him
self in body and spirit. Russian
aristocrat, boy and man, then rebel
against this birthright OF privilege, 1t
is this particular person who steps out
in each stage at some critical moment
of decision and action.
The part of Alexander NaZaroh has
been that of selecting from a bewilder-
ing bulk of performance, that of sens
ing and producing proper emphasis at
one point and another for the sake Of
true proportions, for re-embodied
totality of this prodigiouS Russian
genius. Familiar as Tolstoy himself
with the Russian background, NJ.
Nazaroff becomes a mastery interpreter
of much in the life of Tolstoy, that TO
an alien writer, no matter how gifted,
would be unappreciated and. therefore,
neglected or misconstrued. Akin in ma
tional mentality, also, the two come
together in q deep kinShip that makes
this author legitimately an interpreter
of certain puzzling contradictions-so
they are called-in the behaviorS OF ad-
vance and recession that have made the
TolStoy student unhappy. So, from gal
liant soldier to convinced and influential
paciflst, from family man to solitary
recluse, M. Nazaro6 offers TolStoy in
his own person to readers for q sur
pasSingly rich and significant passage
through life by one Of the great geniuses
of later years Comprehensive, dramatic,
at points of critical and appraising
Is study that Is both needed and that
is, besides, q deeply rich response to
such need.
ANNA KARENINA. Count Leo TolStoy.
The Modern Library.
Having read Alexander NaZaroff's
"TolStoy: the 1nconStant Genius" your
next move is bound to be In the direc-
ton of q rereading of some of the great
Russians novels. And here in most
available form is the one of all others
most likely to come to mind for such an
adventure.
Oh, yes, we all say that the Russian
novels are too long, quite too long for
time. Rather facing upon eternity in
stead. Compared with War and
Peace" this one is short-only about a
thousand pages and concerned with no
more than a couple of hundred men
and women moving about within 1t.
Let us hear M NaZaroff talk a little
about this novel. He calls this the
second summit" of Tolstoy'S genius.
the first, Of course, gained by War and
Peace" Moreover It seems to have a
plot, rather two plots running along to-
gether, with innumerable minor ones
tagging along here and there. Such Is
life, you know sprawling thing, I'M
tidy, inconsequential and of hit-or-
miss arrangement. Life is never the
picked-up, band-boxed affair that the
modern novelist produces. Tolstoy Is
like life-often confusing therefore. But
here are the two plots to be followed In
their panoramic effect of projecting the
Russia of 1870 and thereabout. AS you
recall. this novel is a story of sin and !
its punishment-woman's sin and its
punishment The man sinner came out |
in immemorial fashion-a family hap |