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This anthology is the fullest edition to date of the rich variety of Tolstoy's philosophical output collected in a single volume that covers more than seven decades of his life, from 1835 to 1910. The seventy-seven texts included exemplify Tolstoy as an artistically inventive, intellectually powerful, challenging, and absorbing thinker.
List of contents
Acknowledgments
Credits
Illustrations
A Note on the Text
Editor's Introduction-"The Magic Mountain": On the Textual Shape of Tolstoy's Philosophy
Section I. Fragments, Letters, Notes, Reflections, and Talks
Part 1. Tolstoy's Juvenilia (1835-50)
1. Childhood Fancies [1835]
2. Love of the Fatherland [Amour de la Patrie]
3. A Fragment on the Past, the Present, and the Future [end of the 1830s/the early 1840s]
4. Notes on the Second Chapter of the "Caractères" of La Bruyère [end of the 1830s/the early 1840s]
5. Philosophical Observations on the Discourses of J. J. Rousseau [ca. 1847-52]
6. A Fragment without a Title I [undated, 1840s]
7. A Fragment without a Title II [undated, 1840s]
8. On the Aim of Philosophy [undated, 1840s]
9. A Fragment without a Title III [undated, ca. 1847]
10. A Fragment on Criminal Law [1847]
11. Three Fragments on Music [1848-50]
Part 2: Writings of the 1850s
12. Why People Write [1851]
13. On Prayer [1852]
14. A Note on Farming [1856]
15. Letter to Count Bludov [1856]
16. On Military Criminal Law [1856]
17. A Note on The Nobility [1858]
18. A Talk Delivered at the Society of Lovers of Russian Literature [1859]
Part 3: Writings of the 1860s
19. On Violence [late 1850s-early 1860s]
20. On the Tasks of Pedagogy [1860]
21. On the Character of Thinking in Youth and in Old Age [1862-63]
22. On Religion [1865]
23. A Speech in Defense of Soldier Vasilii Shibunin [1866]
24. Progress [1868]
25. On Marriage and On Woman's Vocation [ca. September-December 1868]
26. A Philosophical Fragment [1868]
27. The Society of Independents [1868-69]
Part 4: Writings of the 1870s
28. On the Afterlife outside of Time and Space [1875]
29. On the Soul and Its Life beyond the Life Known and Comprehensible to Us [1875]
30. A Letter to N. N. Strakhov [November 30, 1875]
31. On the Significance of Christian Religion [1875-76]
32. A Conversation about Science [1875-76]
33. The Definition of Religion-Faith [1875-76]
34. The Psychology of Everyday [1875-76]
35. A Christian Catechism [1877]
36. Interlocutors [1877-78]
Part 5: Writings of the 1880s
37. The Kingdom of God [1879-86]
38. What a Christian Should and Should Not Do [1879-86]
39. To Whom Do We Belong? [1879-86]
40. The Sermon on the Mount [1884]
41. On Charity [1885]
42. Preface to
Tsvetnik [
The Flower Garland] [1886]
43. The Concept of Life [1887]
Part 6: Writings of the 1890s
44. On Science and Art [1889
-91]
45. Concerning the Freedom of the Will (from the unpublished work) [1894]
46. A Letter to Alexander Macdonald about Resurrection [1895]*
47. How Should the Gospel Be Read and Of What Does Its Essence Consist? [1896]
48. Patriotism, or Peace? [1896]*
49. Preface to
Modern Science by Edward Carpenter [1897-98]*
Part 7: Writings of the 1900s
50. On Religious Tolerance [1901]
51. On the Consciousness of the Spiritual [1903]
52. Introduction to
A Short Biography of Garrison [1903-04]*
53. On the Social Movement in Russia [January 13, 1905]
54. Discourses with Children on Moral Questions [1907]
55. Introduction to the Collection, Selected Thoughts of La Bruyère [1907]
56. Religion and Science [August 1908]
57. Reminiscences about the Court-Martial of a Soldier [1908]
58. A Variant of the Article "On Upbringing" [1909]
59. A Letter to a Student Concerning Law [1909]
60. On
Signposts [
O Vekhakh] [1909]
61. Reminiscences about N. Ia. Grot [1910]
62. On Insanity [1910]
63. Introduction to The Path of Life [1910]
Section II. Fictions
Part 8: Exercises, Parables, Parodies, Satires, Tales, Vitae, and Visions
64. Apprentice's Writings [ca. 1839; but no later than 1840-41]
65. A Tale about How Another Girl Named Varinka Grew Up Fast [1857-58]
66. A DREAM [1857-58] 1st version
67. A DREAM [1863] 2nd version
68. An Anecdote about a Bashful Young Man [1868-69]
69. A Fairy Tale [1873]
70. The Vita and Martyrdom of Justin the Philosopher [1874-75]
71. A Colloquy of Idlers [1887]
72. Three Parables [1895]
73. Two Different Versions of the History of the Beehive with a Lacquer-Painted Lid [1888/1900]
74. Labor, Death, and Sickness [1903]
75. Three Questions [1903]
76. This Is You [1903]
77. The Wolf [1908]
Notes
Further Reading in English
Index of Names and Titles
Index of Terms
About the author
Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) was a Russian writer and philosopher best known for his monumental novels, including War and Peace and Anna Karenina. Born into an aristocratic family, Tolstoy later embraced a simple life and a spiritual and moral philosophy that influenced his later works. His advocacy for nonviolent resistance and Christian anarchism, as expressed in The Kingdom of God Is Within You, left a lasting impact on social and political thought.
Summary
This anthology is the fullest edition to date of the rich variety of Tolstoy’s philosophical output collected in a single volume that covers more than seven decades of his life, from 1835 to 1910. The seventy-seven texts included exemplify Tolstoy as an artistically inventive, intellectually powerful, challenging, and absorbing thinker.
