What historical period covers war and peace. Revealing the features of the epic in the novel "War and Peace

1) "... a thin, miniature brunette with a soft, tinted look with long eyelashes, a thick black braid that wrapped around her head twice, and a yellowish tint of skin on her face and especially on naked, thin, but graceful muscular arms and neck."

2) “Black-eyed, with a big mouth, an ugly, but lively girl, with her childish open shoulders that jumped out of her corsage from a quick run, with her black curls knocked back ...”

3) “A tall beautiful lady with a huge braid and very bare white, full shoulders and a neck, on which there was a double string of large pearls ...”

3 . With whom did Pierre Bezukhov duel?a) Nikolai Rostov; b) Anatole Kuragin; c) Dolokhov; d) Andrei Bolkonsky.

4. Which of the heroes of the novel dreams of "to be a soldier, just a soldier. Enter this common life with your whole being, imbued with what makes them so "?

A) Bolkonsky, b) Tushin, c) Nikolai Rostov, d) Pierre Bezukhov

5. At what point in the life of Andrei Bolkonskydisappointed in his dream of fame and exploits?a) During the arrival at the father's estate,

B) After the Battle of Borodino
c) After the surrender of Moscow
d) After being wounded at Austerlitz

6. What is the family in the novel"War and Peace" lives "with the mind of the heart"? a) Bolkonsky
b) Kuragins
c) Bezukhov
d) Rostov

7. What general ideaaccording to Leo Tolstoy, is the whole action of the novel “War and Peace” subordinated? a) "family thought", b) a historical event, c) "people's thought", d) Leo Tolstoy did not have a general idea

8. Give the name of the critic whodefined the features of Tolstoy's psychologism as "dialectics of the soul". a) N.A. Dobrolyubov, b) V.G. Belinsky, c) D.I. Pisarev, d) N.G. Chernyshevsky

9 . What figurative and expressive means is the main one in the work "War and Peace"? a) metaphor b) antithesis c) hyperbole d) oxymoron

10. What episode does it startthe action of Leo Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace"?

a) from a description of the war c) from the characteristics of the Rostov family

b) from the description of the evening by A.P. Sherer; d) from the description of St. Petersburg.

11. Who are the characters in the novel and who are they talking about?: “This is one of those rare women with whom you can be dead for your honor; and, my God, what would I give now not to be married!” a) Pierre about Helen, b) Bolkonsky about Natasha Rostova, c) Bolkonsky about Liza, d) Pierre about Rostova

12 . Name the estate in the novel by L.N. Tolstoy "War and Peace", which the old prince Nikolai Bolkonsky gave to his son Andrei Bolkonsky during his lifetime. a) Otradnoye, b) Bald Mountains, c) Bogucharovo,

13. In what historical era does the action of Leo Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace" develop?

a) the era of Catherine II c) the era of Alexander I

b) the reign of Nicholas II d) the era of Alexander II

14. Remember the family tree of the princes Bolkonsky. Which of the Russian princes was the founder of their family? a) Rurik, b) Romanov, c) Monomakh

Grade 10. Test work based on the novel by L.N. Tolstoy "War and Peace"

Option 2

1 . How many characters are there in the novel?a) more than 350, b) more than 550, c) more than 140, d) about 500.

- Pictures of Russian history (Battles of Shengraben and Austerlitz, the Peace of Tilsit, the war of 1812, the fire of Moscow, the partisan movement). - Events of social and political life (Freemasonry, Speransky's legislative activity, the first organizations of the Decembrists). - Relations between landowners and peasants (transformation of Pierre, Andrei; rebellion of the Bogucharov peasants, indignation of Moscow artisans).

Display of various segments of the population (local, Moscow, St. Petersburg nobility; officials; army; peasants). - A wide panorama of everyday scenes of noble life (balls, high society receptions, dinners, hunting, visiting the theater, etc.)

A huge number of human characters.

Long time span (15 years).

Wide coverage of space (Petersburg, Moscow, Lysyye Gory and Otradnoye estates, Austria, Smolensk, Borodino

Thus, Tolstoy's idea required the creation of a new genre, and only an epic novel could embody all the author's conditions.

The main method of composition of the novel is antithesis. Its poles are Napoleon and Kutuzov, embodying diametrically opposed philosophical and moral principles. All the main characters are distributed between these poles.

Antithesis- (from Greek, antitesis - contradiction, opposition) - opposition.

A distinctive feature of the composition of "War and Peace" is that the writer transfers the action from one place to another, moves from events associated with one storyline to events associated with another line; from private destinies to historical events.

In order to sharpen the features of certain character events, the writer often resorts to the method of contrasts (antithesis). This is expressed in the very title of the novel: war is peace, and in the vital material that formed the basis of the work. The contrast determines the images of individual heroes (Natasha Rostova and Helen Bezukhova, Princess Marya and Julie Karagina), and historical phenomena (Battle of Austerlitz-Battle of Borodino), historical figures (Kutuzov-Napoleon).

On the basis of the principle, antitheses are also introduced into the general structure of the work and images of two cities - Moscow and St. Petersburg. It is in Moscow that the main significant events of the novel take place. Tolstoy's favorite and most dear heroes live in this city: the Rostovs, Bezukhov. Moscow is presented in the work as a soulful city, relatives, relatives. In the current heroic situation, Moscow is, as it were, on the verge between war and peace: if Napoleon captures it, then selfish arbitrariness will win, and if Kutuzov defends, then the principle of unity, the tribal principle.

Petersburg, on the other hand, acts as an unnatural, alien city, it can be taken out of the "swarm" unity formed by the inhabitants of Moscow and the city itself. The war does not affect St. Petersburg, but even when they learn terrible news from Moscow, the inhabitants of the city on the Neva do not make any attempts to help people in trouble, and are outside the heroic situation.

Also, the separation of St. Petersburg from the tribal whole is facilitated by one of the existing myths about its foundation - that it was built at the whim of the king, and not according to the needs of the people, and stands on the bones. Tolstoy does not sympathize with this city, and, accordingly, with those heroes who, at the request of the author, turn out to be its inhabitants - regular visitors to the salons of Anna Scherer and Helen

Contrastingly compared in the novel are the types of human natures - emotional and ideological. So, the Bolkonsky family embodies the intellectual and rational principle, the Rostov family embodies the emotional and intuitive.

The very movement of the plot in the novel is due to the principle of "linkages" (L.N. Tolstoy), which leaves the impression of a mosaic of events. There are several storylines in the work, five hundred and fifty nine characters, among which there are real historical figures, fictional heroes, and nameless characters (“the general who ordered”). The artistic time and artistic space of "War and Peace" are extensive. The content of the novel covers a large period - from 1805 to 1820. From Russia, the action is transferred to Prussia, Austria, Poland, from Smolensk to Moscow, from St. Petersburg to the countryside. Before us are the emperor’s palace, the salon of Anna Pavlovna Scherer, the mansion of the dying Count Bezukhov, the Rostovs’ estate in Otradnoye, the Bolkonsky’s house in Bogucharovo, a peasant’s hut in Fili, the fields of Austerlitz, Shengraben and Borodino battles, camping tents of soldiers.

In the center of the novel lies a chronicle of the life of three noble families - the Rostovs, Bolkonskys and Kuragins. At the same time, in the life of each of the families there are culminating events. Thus, the episodes depicting Natasha's passion for Anatole, her refusal to Prince Andrei Tolstoy, was assessed as "the most difficult place and knot of the whole novel." So did the readers. “The main interest of the book, as a novel,” wrote V.F. Odoevsky, - begins with this climax. And he added: "A curious denouement." However, the author himself noted that in the novel "the death of one person only aroused interest in other persons, and marriage seemed mostly the plot, and not the denouement of interest." The death of Count Bezukhov, the marriage of Pierre to Helene, the unsuccessful courtship of Prince Vasily are thus important initial, but not defining plot points of the work. At the same time, the personal life of the heroes is inextricably linked with the most important historical events of the era.

The flow of private life in the novel organically merges with the historical plot. “Three main historical events form the pivotal line of the plot development. The plot is 1805, the beginning of the war with Napoleon, the period, the main events of which are the battles of Austerlitz and Shengraben.<…>These events of the first military stage precede the epic of the people's war of 1812 and serve as the beginning of the further development of the lives of the heroes - Andrei Bolkonsky, Nikolai Rostov, Dolokhov and others. 1812, the battle of Borodino is the climax of the novel"

The battle of Borodino and the abandonment of Moscow is a whole epoch in the spiritual development of the heroes, a kind of focus in which their destinies converge. It is with this event that the formation of new qualities in them, new views on the world and society is connected. Through the test of fire, suffering, death, all the main characters of the novel are carried out. Shortly before the Battle of Borodino, the old man Bolkonsky dies, and Princess Marya takes his death hard. 1812 changes a lot in the life of Pierre Bezukhov. This is a period of restoring spiritual integrity, introducing him to the “general”, affirming in his soul his sense of the harmony of life. An important role here was played by Pierre's visit to the Rayevsky battery during the Battle of Borodino and his stay in French captivity. Being on the Borodino field, among the endless roar of cannons, the smoke of shells, the screech of bullets, the hero experiences a feeling of horror, mortal fear. The soldiers seem to him strong and courageous, they have no fear, no fear for their lives. The very patriotism of these people, seemingly unconscious, comes from the very essence of nature, their behavior is simple and natural. And Pierre wants to become "just a soldier", to free himself from the "burden of the external person", from everything artificial, superficial. Faced with the people's milieu for the first time, he keenly feels the falsity and insignificance of the secular-conventional world, he feels the fallacy of his former views and attitudes. The Battle of Borodino becomes fateful for Prince Andrei. In battle, he is seriously wounded, after which he is operated on. Here the hero again feels the proximity of death, and a turning point occurs in his worldview. After suffering, he feels "a bliss that he has not experienced for a long time." His heart is filled with a feeling of Christian love that he had not experienced before, he finally overcomes his vanity, selfishness, aristocratic prejudices. He feels pity and compassion when he sees the wounded Anatole lying next to him. “Compassion, love for brothers, for those who love us, hate us, love for enemies - yes, that love that God preached on earth ...” - all this is suddenly revealed to Prince Andrei. Bolkonsky dies, and his death becomes the greatest grief for Princess Marya and Natasha. Finally, the Battle of Borodino becomes a turning point in the development of the historical theme, symbolizing the victory of Russia.

The denouement of the novel is the victory over Napoleon, the defeat of the French and the emergence of new ideas in Russian society. These events determine the personal destinies of the heroes, without obscuring, however, the writer's human personality. historical events are shown by Tolstoy through the prism of various destinies and characters.

An important role in the novel is played by the author's digressions, which reveal Tolstoy's philosophical and religious-ethical views, his thoughts about the historical process. The philosophical problems of the author's digressions are the structure of the world and the place of a person in it, the role of the individual in history, the relationship between freedom and necessity in the fate of a person, true and false values ​​in life. In the novel, Tolstoy reveals his views on the war of 1812, on its participants. These views are based on historical fatalism (personality does not play a role in the historical process). History, according to the writer, is a movement of huge human masses (Tolstoy considered the Russian people to be the main character of the novel, noting that he most of all valued "people's thought" in "War and Peace").

The compositional role of author's digressions is different. Thus, in the third part, the author discusses the war of 1812 as a people's war of liberation, and this digression plays the role of a kind of generalization of the artistic chapters. The introduction of the author's journalistic and philosophical reasoning "expands the boundaries of the narrative and at the same time combines the historical, philosophical novel and the psychological "essay on morals" into one organic whole.

It is worth noting that the author's voice "reignedly dominates the novel. The author is omniscient, he rises above the characters and events to an unattainable height. According to M. Bakhtin's definition, Tolstoy's novel is "monologic" (in contrast to Dostoevsky's "polyphonic" or "polyphonic" novel)"

Thus, once again we note the artistic originality of "War and Peace". Tolstoy created a work that organically combines the features of an epic, a historical novel, a chronicle, an essay on morals, generously saturating it with philosophical problems and psychological analysis. The novel does not have a single intrigue, we see several storylines, each of which is correlated with the most important historical events of the era. Life in Tolstoy is presented in all its diversity. All these artistic properties made the novel a masterpiece of world literature.

The work of T. marked a new stage in the development of Russian and world realism, threw a bridge between the traditions of the classical novel of the 19th century. and literature of the 20th century. The realism of T. is characterized by a special frankness of tone, directness and, as a result, will crush, strength and sharpness in exposing social contradictions. Direct emotional contagion, the ability to recreate the very "flesh of life" are combined in Tolstoy's work with flexible and sharp thought, deep, extremely sincere psychological analysis. Healthy, full-blooded realism T. strives for a combination of analysis and synthesis, gravitates toward a holistic understanding of the world, awareness of the laws by which human life moves. Not trusting the prevailing opinions and prejudices, T. wants to look at everything anew and in his own way; discarding various types of literary cliches, he builds his art only on what he himself saw, understood and guessed. T. capture the spiritual being of the individual, the tension of the seeking thought, the anxieties of conscience. But his realism is also characterized by plastic modeling of characters, vivid verbal painting in everyday life, historical and genre scenes.

The realism of T., closely connected with the national Russian tradition, which developed and consolidated it, also carries an enormous universal content. The traditions of realism in T. were accepted and assimilated by the young Soviet literature. They still remain for Soviet writers one of the most important and viable traditions of the classical heritage.

T. had a huge impact on the evolution of European humanism, on the development of realistic traditions in world literature. In France, Romain Rolland, F. Mauriac and R. Martin du Gard, in the USA E. Hemingway and T. Wolfe, in England J. Galsworthy and B. Shaw, in Germany T. Mann and A. Zegers, in Sweden A. Strindberg and A. Lundqvist, in Austria R. M. Rilke, in Poland E. Ozheshko, B. Prus, J. Ivashkevich, in Czechoslovakia M. Puimanova, in China Lao She, in Japan Tokutomi Roca - each in his own way experienced The influence of T.'s creativity was great. T.'s influence on the culture of India and on the activities of M. Gandhi. Works T. countless times filmed and staged in the USSR and abroad. T.'s plays have been repeatedly staged on the stages of the whole world.

The study of T.'s work in domestic and world literary criticism began during the life of the writer. Articles about it by G. V. Plekhanov and V. G. Korolenko and M. Gorky’s essay “Leo Tolstoy” (1919) were of significant importance for the study of the subject. After the October Revolution of 1917, interest in T.'s legacy increased markedly.

Test based on the novel by L. N. Tolstoy "War and Peace" (volume 1) Option 1
1) Prince Nikolai Andreevich, Andrei, Marya, Nikolenka. Enter the name of this family. 6) How many native children were there in the family of Count Rostov?
a) two b) three c) four d) five
2) In what historical era does the action of Leo Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace" develop?
a) the era of Catherine II c) the era of Alexander I
b) the reign of Nicholas II d) the era of Alexander II 7) Whose portrait is this? Write the character's first and last name.
"... a massive, fat young man with a cropped head, wearing glasses, light trousers in the fashion of the time, with a high frill and in a brown tailcoat."
3) From what episode does the action of the novel begin?
a) from the author's reflections on the war
b) from a description of the evening at the maid of honor of the Empress
c) with the characteristics of the Rostov family
d) from the description of St. Petersburg 8) Determine the culmination of the 1st volume of the novel.
a) Battle of Austerlitz
b) meeting of emperors in Tilsit
c) name day in the Rostovs' house
d) council in Fili
4) Which of the heroes of the novel "War and Peace" for the first time appears before us like this:
“Black-eyed, with a big mouth, ugly, but lively, with her childish open shoulders, which shrank, moved in her corsage from fast running, with her black curls knocked back, thin bare arms and small legs in lace knickers and open shoes” ? 9) Find out the hero, write his first and last name.
“Why not marry if she is very rich? It never gets in the way, thought ______________.
He shaved, perfumed himself with the thoroughness and panache that had become his habit, and with a good-natured victorious expression innate to him, carrying his beautiful head high, entered the room ...
5) Whose portrait is this? Write the character's first and last name.
"... was of small stature, a very handsome young man with definite and dry features." 10) Who was Natasha Rostova in love with at the moment when the author introduces the readers to the heroes of the work?
Write the character's first and last name.
Test based on the novel by L. N. Tolstoy "War and Peace" (volume 1) Option 2
1) Count Ilya Andreevich, Natasha, Nikolai, Petya ...
Enter the name of this family. 6) Write what was the name of the Bolkonsky estate, where did Prince Bolkonsky live with his daughter?
2) The action of the novel "War and Peace" was originally supposed to cover a huge period of Russian history. Which of the dates is not related to the planned plot?
a) 1807 b) 1825 c) 1856 d) 1863 7) Write what goal Prince Vasily Kuragin set for himself after Pierre became rich.
3) The action of the novel "War and Peace" begins
a) January 1812
b) in May 1807
c) in July 1805
d) in April 1801 8) Indicate the name of the battle, after which Prince Andrei became disillusioned with his idol - Napoleon.
a) Shengrabenskoe c) Borodino
b) Friedland d) Austerlitz 4) Who is m-lle Bourienne (Mademoiselle Bourienne)?
a) friend of Julie Karaginoybe) niece of Anna Pavlovna Shererv) companion of Maria Bolkonskaya
d) a guest of the Rostov family 9) Recognize the hero of the novel "War and Peace" by signs and write the name and surname.
The whiteness of the shoulders, the gloss of the hair and diamonds, the unchanging smile, the very open chest and back...

5) Why is Prince Andrei going to serve in the army (volume 1)?
a) this is how an officer's duty is presented to him
b) because of the desire for fame
c) because of the desire to defend the Motherland
d) at the insistence of the father
10) Find out the heroine and write her first and last name.
"She was so bad ... It was not the dress that was bad, but the face and the whole figure ... if you attach a blue ribbon to your hair, combed up, and pull down a blue scarf from a brown dress, etc., then everything will be fine. ... a frightened face and figure it was impossible to change, and ... the face itself remained pitiful and ugly. "

Attached files

"War and Peace" is the central work in Tolstoy's creative heritage, on which the writer worked for 7 years. By the time the final version of the novel was created, its idea and characteristics of the characters had largely changed: initially, the author conceived the work about the Decembrist Peter and his wife Natalya, who returned after the amnesty of 1855, but gradually the original idea changed - the boundaries of the novel’s action in time and space expanded, along with novelistic, in the work of Tolstoy the epic beginning is clearly expressed. The author's task is to understand and comprehend his own modernity through history.

The epic novel is based on events that are especially important for the history of the people; critical, milestone epochs, revealing important patterns of the country's historical development. The subject of Tolstoy's image was history itself, presented as a single stream of life, combining scenes of battles and love dreams of heroes, historical meetings of monarchs or generals and private joys and sufferings. In this movement, the cry of the newborn Nikolenka Bolkonsky, and the groans of the wounded on the Borodino field, and the laughter of Natasha Rostova, and the tears of Kutuzov, who learned that the French had finally left devastated Moscow, turn out to be natural manifestations of life itself. History appears in Tolstoy's novel as alive, moving, being created before our eyes, this single life stream organically includes the author's comments and reflections, and therefore the past seems in the novel not distant from us, but close, modern, revealing a lot in today's life.

The action of the epic novel covers a significant time period and takes place over a vast area, and, as a result, the work of this genre is especially large in volume and complex in construction. The time of action in Tolstoy's work spans 15 years: the novel opens with an evening scene in the house of Anna Pavlovna Scherer in 1805 and ends with a depiction of the private life of Pierre Bezukhov and Natasha Rostova, Nikolai Rostov and Marya Bolkonskaya in 1820. The huge historical and vital material of the novel will make up three main layers: 1805-1811 are the complex French-Russian relations of the early 19th century, the main characters' desire for happiness, gains and losses along the way; the culmination of the novel is the war of 1812, in the fire of which different destinies and private lives were united; continuation of the spiritual search for heroes after this national event, which predetermined the further history of the whole country and individuals.

On the pages of the novel, Tolstoy creates a capacious image of the people - a kind of unity of spirit in many different individuals. The whole epic scale of the novel is held together by the “folk idea”, which Tolstoy called “especially beloved”.

The image of the nation's existence in the genre of the epic novel is combined with the disclosure of the depths of an individual soul; in the existence of an individual person, the state of the whole world is manifested in its own way; in private, specific episodes of the life of heroes, deep patterns of history are revealed. The novel beginning in the epic is precisely connected with the depiction of unique destinies and characters, the complex individual spiritual quest of the heroes.

"War and Peace" is a great work. What is the history of the creation of the epic novel? L. N. Tolstoy himself more than once wondered why in life it happens this way and not otherwise ... Indeed, why, for what and how did the creative process of creating the greatest work of all times and peoples proceed? After all, it took seven long years to write it ...

The history of the creation of the novel "War and Peace": the first evidence of the beginning of work

In September 1863, a letter arrives in Yasnaya Polyana from the father of Sofya Andreevna Tolstoy - A.E. Bersa. He writes that the day before, he and Lev Nikolayevich had a long conversation about the people's war against Napoleon and about that era in general - the count intends to start writing a novel dedicated to those great and memorable events in the history of Russia. The mention of this letter is not accidental, since it is considered "the first accurate evidence" of the beginning of the work of the great Russian writer on the novel "War and Peace". This is also confirmed by another document dated the same year a month later: Lev Nikolaevich writes to a relative about his new idea. He was already involved in work on an epic novel about the events of the beginning of the century and up to the 50s. How much moral strength and energy he needs to carry out what he has planned, he says, and how much he already possesses, he already writes and thinks about everything in the way that he "has never written or thought about."

First idea

The history of the creation of Tolstoy's novel "War and Peace" indicates that the writer's original intention was to create a book about the difficult fate of a Decembrist who returned to his native land in 1865 (the time of the abolition of serfdom) after many years of exile in Siberia. However, Lev Nikolayevich soon revised his idea and turned to the historical events of 1825 - the time. As a result, this idea was also abandoned: the protagonist's youth took place against the backdrop of the Patriotic War of 1912, a formidable and glorious time for the entire Russian people, which, in turn, was another link in the unbreakable chain of events of 1805. Tolstoy decided to start telling stories from the very beginning - the beginning of the 19th century - and revived the half-century history of the Russian state with the help of not one main character, but many vivid images.

The history of the creation of the novel "War and Peace" or "Three Pores"

We continue ... Undoubtedly, a vivid idea of ​​the writer's work on the novel is given by his story of creation ("War and Peace"). So, the time and place of the novel are determined. The author leads the main characters - the Decembrists, through three historically significant periods of time, hence the original title of the work "Three Pores".

The first part covers the period from the beginning of the 19th century until 1812, when the youth of the heroes coincided with the war between Russia and Napoleonic France. The second is the 20s, not without including the most important thing - the Decembrist uprising in 1825. And, finally, the third, final part - the 50s - the time of the return of the rebels from exile under the amnesty granted by the emperor against the backdrop of such tragic pages of Russian history as the inglorious defeat and death of Nicholas I.

Well, the novel, in its conception and scope, promised to be global and demanded a different art form, and it was found. According to Lev Nikolayevich himself, “War and Peace” is not historical chronicles, and not a poem, and not even just a novel, but a new genre in fiction - an epic novel, where the fates of many people and an entire nation are associated with grandiose historical events .

torment

Work on the work was very difficult. The history of creation ("War and Peace") suggests that many times Lev Nikolayevich took the first steps and immediately stopped writing. There are fifteen versions of the first chapters of the work in the writer's archive. What hindered? What haunted the Russian genius? The desire to fully express their thoughts, their religious and philosophical ideas, research, their vision of history, to give their assessments of those socio-political processes, the huge role not of emperors, not leaders, but of the whole people in the history of the country. This required a colossal effort of all spiritual forces. More than once he lost and regained hope to fulfill his plan to the end. Hence the idea of ​​the novel, and the names of the early editions: "Three Pores", "All's well that ends well", "1805". They seem to have changed more than once.

Patriotic War of 1812

Thus, the author’s long creative throwing ended in a narrowing of the time frame - Tolstoy focused all his attention on 1812, the war of Russia against the “Great Army” of the French Emperor Napoleon, and only in the epilogue touched on the birth of the Decembrist movement.

The smells and sounds of war... To convey them, it was necessary to study a huge amount of material. This is fiction of that time, and historical documents, memoirs and letters of contemporaries of those events, battle plans, orders and orders of military commanders ... He spared neither time nor effort. From the very beginning, he rejected all those historical chronicles that sought to portray the war as a battlefield between two emperors, extolling first one, then the other. The writer did not belittle their merits and their significance, but put the people and their spirit at the forefront.

As you can see, the work has an incredibly interesting history of creation. "War and Peace" boasts another interesting fact. Between the manuscripts, another small, but nevertheless important document has been preserved - a sheet with the notes of the writer himself, made during his stay on it. On it, he captured the horizon line, indicating exactly where which villages were. Here you can also see the line of movement of the sun during the battle itself. All this, one might say, is bare sketches, sketches of what was later destined under the pen of a genius to turn into a real picture depicting a great full of movement, life, extraordinary colors and sounds. Incredible and amazing, isn't it?

chance and genius

L. Tolstoy on the pages of his novel talked a lot about the laws of history. His conclusions are also applicable to life, they contain much that concerns a great work, in particular the history of creation. "War and Peace" went through many stages to become a real masterpiece.

Science says that chance and genius are to blame for everything: chance offered to capture the half-century history of Russia with the help of artistic means, and the genius - Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy - took advantage of it. But from this follow new questions about what this case is, what genius is. On the one hand, these are just words designed to explain what is actually inexplicable, and on the other hand, it is impossible to deny some of their suitability and usefulness, at least they denote "a certain degree of understanding of things."

Where and how the idea itself and the history of the creation of the novel "War and Peace" appeared - it is impossible to find out until the end, there are only bare facts, therefore we say "case". Further - more: we read the novel and cannot imagine that power, that human spirit, or rather superhuman, which managed to clothe the deepest philosophical thoughts and ideas in an amazing form - therefore we say "genius".

The longer the series of “cases” that passes before us, the more the facets of the author’s genius shine, the closer we seem to be to revealing the secret of L. Tolstoy’s genius and some incomprehensible truth contained in the work. But this is an illusion. What to do? Lev Nikolaevich believed in the only possible understanding of the world order - the renunciation of knowledge of the ultimate goal. If we admit that the ultimate goal of creating a novel is inaccessible to us, if we renounce all the reasons, visible and invisible, that prompted the writer to take up writing a work, we will comprehend or at least admire and enjoy to the full its infinite depth, designed to serve common goals, not always accessible to human understanding. As the writer himself said while working on the novel, the ultimate goal of the artist is not the undeniable resolution of issues, but leading and pushing the reader to love life in all its countless manifestations, so that he would cry and laugh along with the main characters.