Sebastopol in December

by Leo Tolstoy

Das große Drama bei Sewastopol erschütterte gewaltig den jungen Dichter-Offizier, zeigte ihm die nackte, abschreckende Häßlichkeit des Krieges und ließ ihn erkennen, wie winzig klein das Leben des Einzelnen ist gegenüber dem Sterben der Massen. Noch viel mehr als im Kaukasus lernte er hier den einfachen, ungebildeten Soldaten kennen und lieben, dessen Tapferkeit und einfache Größe ihn zur Bewunderung hinrissen. Die Liebe und Verehrung für das einfache Volk befestigte sich immer mehr und mehr in seinem Herzen. — In drei ergreifenden Schilderungen, die ihm viel Ruhm eingetragen, beschreibt er dieses lebendige Drama. Es sind: Sewastopol im Dezember 1854; Sewastopol im Mai; Sewastopol im August 1855. Nach der Übergabe Sewastopols wurde Tolstoi vom Kommandeur Kryschanowsky als Kurier nach Petersburg geschickt. Bald darauf legte er das Schwert für immer aus der Hand, um von nun an eine andere Waffe zu führen — die Feder.

Genres: Short Stories

229 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1961

About the author

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Russian: Лев Николаевич Толстой; most appropriately used Liev Tolstoy; commonly Leo Tolstoy in Anglophone countries) was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist fiction. Many consider Tolstoy to have been one of the world's greatest novelists. Tolstoy is equally known for his complicated and paradoxical persona and for his extreme moralistic and ascetic views, which he adopted after a moral crisis and spiritual awakening in the 1870s, after which he also became noted as a moral thinker and social reformer.

His literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount, caused him in later life to become a fervent Christian anarchist and anarcho-pacifist. His ideas on nonviolent resistance, expressed in such works as The Kingdom of God Is Within You, were to have a profound impact on such pivotal twentieth-century figures as Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Reviews

[Miloš Stepanović Tito · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pročitao sam ovu kratku knjigu kao zasebnu pripovetku i moram reći, doduše mi se dopao stil pisanja i opisivanja dragog Tolstoja, da sam bio duboko razočaran kad sam došao do kraja. Nikakvog bitnog preokreta, nikakvog preteranog upoznavanja sa likovima sem fizičkog nivoa. Kao da sam pratio malo napeto putovanje bezličnih ljudi kroz noći "nemilosrdne" ruske zime. Ali opet, vredelo je samo zbog predivnih izraženih opisa koje nam je Nikolajevič obezbedio.

[Vale Vs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Impactante como Tolstoy siempre puede transmitir la desgracia y las penurias de la guerra, al mismo tiempo que las banalidades y lo cotidiano de la misma.

[Selina · Rating 5 out of 5]

GREAT.

Huge fan of the unconventional second person POV, really cutting descriptions of war.

[Kat · Rating 5 out of 5]

I randomly picked up this book from the library one day because it was very small and it was an old book. I was intrigued just based on the looks of it. Then i saw it was Tolstoy, a classic writer, so I took it home. I have never been attracted to books about war but this was an amazingly poetic tale. He adds a romance to war that I think is very hard for most people to see. I know I usually don't! I enjoyed this book so much that I wrote down several lines from the book to refer back to. As a result of randomly reading this book and enjoying it I will be sure to read more of his works. His perspective is unique and delivery and intoxicating.

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

War, it really is good for books.