Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina

Now then… this is not a good book. I read this book basically, so you don’t have to :D. This mammoth of a text has been on my bookshelf for some time now and I read it during the 2nd UK lockdow, because frankly it was too cold to go outside and I was fed up with watching episode after episode of a crappy show I wasn't even paying attention to. So I thought a bit of Russian culture would be nice. By my oh my 364,000 words, excessive! But to be honest the plot of this book is a bit weak.

The two main storylines which are Anna and Levin who are connected mutually but only ever meet once, towards the books ending. The story is about a married woman, Anna, who has an affair with a young, hot Count called Vronsky and subsquently leaves her husband, her son, and her status for him. Also there is Kitty who is in love with Vronsky, but he does not notice her feelings for him. Alongside this he also chooses Anna over her which causes her to get really upset and nearly die (dramatic much). She ends up marrying Levin who adores her dearly and most of the novel is basically about him, despite the titular character being Anna.

Both Anna and Levin struggle with certain decisions in their lives. Anna craves love, attention, and passion but she incredibly jealous and struggles to speak of her anxieties. She does have a cracking temper which I wouldn’t want to be at the end of but because she cant talk about her feelings she ends up on a downward spiral and feels miserable for much of the novel. Levin’s struggle is different, he wants the simple life and to believe in God but questions religion, which some may find kind of relatable.

All of these characters are insufferable, make poor life choices and don’t pay attention to each other. The story is a lot of waffle and I honestly felt like skipping half of it, especially the farming bits because they dragged on for what felt like years. But despite all that I read it all, cursing page after page. once you finish it you realize that there really was not much point putting in al that effort to read it as you could have guessed the out come of the novels ending.

My only issue is the book is far too long and because of this it makes the text kind of dull and it makes difficult to keep motivated reading something of that length. The movie adaptation of the book is excellent so if you do not feel like reading this marathon of a book, I do recommend that.

The ending of the book is ace and cleverly referenced earlier in the novel, my problem with the plot is that I don’t like the characters of Anna or Levin.

But if you have the time or like a challenge do read Anna Kareninia and let me know your opinons on it!!!