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A Landowner's Morning; Family Happiness & The Devil
Three fictional works combine autobiographical elements with the themes of marriage, sex, and the conflict between traditional values and progress.
216 pages, Hardcover
First published November 1, 1856
6 people are currently reading
69 people want to read
About the author
Leo Tolstoy
7,947 books28.4k followersLev 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.
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.
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
December 15, 2020
Oh sweet Jesus suffering Christ, why do I still want to read more Tolstoy after this? Three Novellas is, astonishingly, three novellas from everyone's favourite misery merchant, and that despair comes in three distinct forms, starting with:
A Land Owner's Morning
This tale explores what happens if you take a fresh, good natured fellow, full of hope and bright ideas, and proceed to push him into increasingly larger and smellier piles of cow manure.
The misery of expectations slowly and subtly beaten down in a single morning by a reality uninterested in your dreams or good intentions, because the world and the lazy, thrifting bastards in it don't give a fuck about you.
Despair rating: 5/10
The Devil
A single man has a perfectly amicable 'friends with benefits' affair with a married village woman, but once he ends the trysts to marry, he becomes filled with an irrational, guilty and dangerous lust.
The misery of being haunted by your past behaviour, paranoia and sexual repression frothing and exploding in a climax both violent and ridiculous.
The book also includes Tolstoy's alternative ending for this novella, which is no less symbolic, but I think the original is much better.
Despair rating: 4/10 (I found it too silly and melodramatic to take seriously)
Family Happiness
A love match marriage irrevocably crumbles after a single, seemingly small incident.
The misery. Just the misery. I both admire and despise this story; it'll be branded into my brain for many years to come and I still wish I hadn't read it. Tolstoy actively tortures you with this novella, as the protagonist is likeable and the initial love story is long and somewhat charming, so I was stupidly lulled into a sense of false security.
This is a tale of the veil falling, when the image of our apparently perfect lovers is first dispelled, and we feel duped and betrayed that our angel is really a human being like the rest of us, with weird habits, pimples and farts smelling like the City of Dis public toilet. With one spouse cold and passive agressive (and a full on bell end in my personal opinion), and the other bewildered and alone, Tolstoy has made this a devastating read.
The main problem for our characters is communication. Our heroine and her husband only widen their divide as time goes on, never quite saying to the other what their actual problems or needs are. Instead, they rely on silence or saying whatever hurts the other in their impotence to speak truthfully, and the urge to break the fourth wall to act as marriage counsellor is overpowering for the reader.
The ending has a bitter sweetness to it, tinged with acrid bile, as the titular Family Happiness is based on a rather sad compromise. Is it realistic? For the time Tolstoy was writing (the miserable fucking badger) than yes, probably. For today? Not quite. Divource (i.e escape) is easier for one, but many of us no longer have the unforgiving rod of social propiety and repression lodged in our arses, and are a bit better at voicing our needs.
Whether it 'holds up' is irrelevant, however. Family Happiness is still extremely effective at stabbing my heart and spitting on the wound, and it is a brilliantly horrible, understated masterpiece of slowly decaying optimism and contentment.
Despair rating: Tori Amos covering Gloomy Sunday
A Land Owner's Morning
This tale explores what happens if you take a fresh, good natured fellow, full of hope and bright ideas, and proceed to push him into increasingly larger and smellier piles of cow manure.
The misery of expectations slowly and subtly beaten down in a single morning by a reality uninterested in your dreams or good intentions, because the world and the lazy, thrifting bastards in it don't give a fuck about you.
Despair rating: 5/10
The Devil
A single man has a perfectly amicable 'friends with benefits' affair with a married village woman, but once he ends the trysts to marry, he becomes filled with an irrational, guilty and dangerous lust.
The misery of being haunted by your past behaviour, paranoia and sexual repression frothing and exploding in a climax both violent and ridiculous.
The book also includes Tolstoy's alternative ending for this novella, which is no less symbolic, but I think the original is much better.
Despair rating: 4/10 (I found it too silly and melodramatic to take seriously)
Family Happiness
A love match marriage irrevocably crumbles after a single, seemingly small incident.
The misery. Just the misery. I both admire and despise this story; it'll be branded into my brain for many years to come and I still wish I hadn't read it. Tolstoy actively tortures you with this novella, as the protagonist is likeable and the initial love story is long and somewhat charming, so I was stupidly lulled into a sense of false security.
This is a tale of the veil falling, when the image of our apparently perfect lovers is first dispelled, and we feel duped and betrayed that our angel is really a human being like the rest of us, with weird habits, pimples and farts smelling like the City of Dis public toilet. With one spouse cold and passive agressive (and a full on bell end in my personal opinion), and the other bewildered and alone, Tolstoy has made this a devastating read.
The main problem for our characters is communication. Our heroine and her husband only widen their divide as time goes on, never quite saying to the other what their actual problems or needs are. Instead, they rely on silence or saying whatever hurts the other in their impotence to speak truthfully, and the urge to break the fourth wall to act as marriage counsellor is overpowering for the reader.
The ending has a bitter sweetness to it, tinged with acrid bile, as the titular Family Happiness is based on a rather sad compromise. Is it realistic? For the time Tolstoy was writing (the miserable fucking badger) than yes, probably. For today? Not quite. Divource (i.e escape) is easier for one, but many of us no longer have the unforgiving rod of social propiety and repression lodged in our arses, and are a bit better at voicing our needs.
Whether it 'holds up' is irrelevant, however. Family Happiness is still extremely effective at stabbing my heart and spitting on the wound, and it is a brilliantly horrible, understated masterpiece of slowly decaying optimism and contentment.
Despair rating: Tori Amos covering Gloomy Sunday
December 7, 2019
3 1/2 stars....Worth the read, but my biggest issue was that the text was in quotes when someone was thinking. I don’t know if this is something in translation or how it was originally written, but it made me have to stop and re read things multiple times throughout the stories. This was my first Leo Tolstoy and i now want to read more!
February 7, 2025
I picked this off the shelf as an easy read to help kick off January only to basically not open it up for the entire month. Which is the opposite thing that happened with "House of the Dead" two years ago. Surely this is a difference between Tolstoy and Dostoevsky and not like, the stressors of my current living and work situation or anything.
The thing that Is interesting about the differences between Tolstoy and Dostoevsky is that of focus. It's hard, when reading translations, to really feel the shades of an author's voice - what is a Tolstoy saying vs. a Dostoevsky one, etc - but it's interesting how much Tolstoy is more revolved around class than Dostoevsky is. War & Peace is almost entirely about upper class families, and I gather that Anna Karenina is the same. While Dostoevsky certainly has well-off characters, he seems far less interested in the goings-on of the upper crust; rather, they're glimpsed through windows in the alley, seen by characters with spiraling luck.
These three stories all feel decidedly aristocratic. The first is fully about a landowner trying to understand the working class, and the other two feature similarly aristocratic characters and couples making rich-people choices and living with the consequences. It gives Tolstoy a more romantic flair as opposed to Dostoevsky's very earthy feel. Both are interested in humanity's heartbeat, just from very different angles.
In any case, I liked these stories despite never fully loving them. I am really fascinated by the mode of the short story, but despite having compelling reflections and fun twists, none of these novellas quite hooked me and kept with me in the way I hope a short story will. I do have a different collection which includes the Death of Ivan Ilych so I'm expecting a little more from that one, but these at least serve as interesting sampler of the things that fascinated Tolstoy through his life.
The thing that Is interesting about the differences between Tolstoy and Dostoevsky is that of focus. It's hard, when reading translations, to really feel the shades of an author's voice - what is a Tolstoy saying vs. a Dostoevsky one, etc - but it's interesting how much Tolstoy is more revolved around class than Dostoevsky is. War & Peace is almost entirely about upper class families, and I gather that Anna Karenina is the same. While Dostoevsky certainly has well-off characters, he seems far less interested in the goings-on of the upper crust; rather, they're glimpsed through windows in the alley, seen by characters with spiraling luck.
These three stories all feel decidedly aristocratic. The first is fully about a landowner trying to understand the working class, and the other two feature similarly aristocratic characters and couples making rich-people choices and living with the consequences. It gives Tolstoy a more romantic flair as opposed to Dostoevsky's very earthy feel. Both are interested in humanity's heartbeat, just from very different angles.
In any case, I liked these stories despite never fully loving them. I am really fascinated by the mode of the short story, but despite having compelling reflections and fun twists, none of these novellas quite hooked me and kept with me in the way I hope a short story will. I do have a different collection which includes the Death of Ivan Ilych so I'm expecting a little more from that one, but these at least serve as interesting sampler of the things that fascinated Tolstoy through his life.
December 9, 2020
3.5/5
I've read only Family Happiness and The Devil.
I've read only Family Happiness and The Devil.
September 23, 2018
I truly enjoyed these three novellas, but especially The Devil and Family Happiness. A landowner’s morning is maybe the most formulaic in expression out of the three, but its topics are genuinely relevant as a non reductionist approach to social idealism in higher class sectors. The Devil and Family Happiness are stories in which desire and idealization are taken as decisive forces affecting public and private responsibilities. Both are in part a critique of masculine sexual desire and conservative fantasies, but they are also great examples of a non-reductionist approach to fiction making.
October 23, 2023
More like a 3.5 but mostly for the translation. I bet there are better translations of these stories out there. The first two had a lot of passages, particularly descriptive ones, which were pretty clunky.
I’ve never read Tolstoy before and wanted to try him out! These were interesting, short, and pretty easy to read. The story notes provided relevant context, which is always appreciated. I’ll definitely be reading more Tolstoy in the future, but likely pay more attention to the quality of the translation!
I’ve never read Tolstoy before and wanted to try him out! These were interesting, short, and pretty easy to read. The story notes provided relevant context, which is always appreciated. I’ll definitely be reading more Tolstoy in the future, but likely pay more attention to the quality of the translation!
July 16, 2024
Poslušah samo "Jutro jednog spahije".
October 10, 2023
helps you appreciate how much Tolstoy developed as a writer over time
August 14, 2015
On The Devil: Mildly disturbed. Is this the male mind? I know it's unfair to stick every guy in the same box, but... Really?
(This is me considerably uncomfortable in a foreign territory. Yes, I have heard that guys always have that on their mind. I just never. Really? Reallyreallyreally?)
I know that this is besides the point. There is more to Tolstoy than that stuff. Still.
In essence, The Devil is desire and control and nature. How they're all moulded together in us, and how we try to make sense of it, and how much blame can we put on ourselves. Ought we put on ourselves. If at all. And there's no answer, I think. From what I can tell, there will always be a party that thinks that whatever the outcome/decision, it is wrong, it should be done another way. Someone will always find insanity in another. And so, we're all insane. Something like that.
(It is way too late for me to be doing this.)
It's very difficult for me to put down my thoughts. Yes, as mentioned before, I think Tolstoy really pinned down human nature. He brought up the perpetual issues we're stuck in - happiness, relationships, what life ought to be like, etc - and unravelled them in the sense that he depicted how things tend to occur, and what mechanisms motivate us. He made some accurate observations.
And yet, I find something missing. I don't know if it's just a mood of mine, but it just seems like... All these... ideas that he presents... They don't. They don't amount to much. You know? I close the book, I nod, I think: You've got that right, sir.Then I shrug - so what?
I think I just need to think about it more. You know, when I read this, I thought it was a good read, but not necessarily something I'd read over. Now I'm thinking I probably will, just because I think there's something missing. He gives you something to contemplate.
(This is me considerably uncomfortable in a foreign territory. Yes, I have heard that guys always have that on their mind. I just never. Really? Reallyreallyreally?)
I know that this is besides the point. There is more to Tolstoy than that stuff. Still.
In essence, The Devil is desire and control and nature. How they're all moulded together in us, and how we try to make sense of it, and how much blame can we put on ourselves. Ought we put on ourselves. If at all. And there's no answer, I think. From what I can tell, there will always be a party that thinks that whatever the outcome/decision, it is wrong, it should be done another way. Someone will always find insanity in another. And so, we're all insane. Something like that.
(It is way too late for me to be doing this.)
It's very difficult for me to put down my thoughts. Yes, as mentioned before, I think Tolstoy really pinned down human nature. He brought up the perpetual issues we're stuck in - happiness, relationships, what life ought to be like, etc - and unravelled them in the sense that he depicted how things tend to occur, and what mechanisms motivate us. He made some accurate observations.
And yet, I find something missing. I don't know if it's just a mood of mine, but it just seems like... All these... ideas that he presents... They don't. They don't amount to much. You know? I close the book, I nod, I think: You've got that right, sir.Then I shrug - so what?
I think I just need to think about it more. You know, when I read this, I thought it was a good read, but not necessarily something I'd read over. Now I'm thinking I probably will, just because I think there's something missing. He gives you something to contemplate.
November 16, 2024
Three lesser known novellas from Russia's greatest un-living author.
Landowner's Morning: Well-written, but I didnt care at all. It must be very difficult owning land and wanting the best for your serfs, but they keep being too damn three dimensional for your patronising assistance.
The Devil: Incredible, insane feat of writing. Truly gets into the mind of his protag in a way that felt real, and organised the story in a compelling order. Neeeeded to find out how it ended. Didn't love how it ended.
A Family Happiness: at times turgid, but on a whole, fucking incredible story about a woman who falls in love with and a man and the grief that comes with having the fiery hot early love morph into a slower, maintainable, steady-marriage love.
I'm finding that Tolstoy is a genius at writing vivid characters, who are so real they remind you of yourself or people you know, putting them in relatable circumstances, and then perfectly showing you how they think.
Landowner's Morning: Well-written, but I didnt care at all. It must be very difficult owning land and wanting the best for your serfs, but they keep being too damn three dimensional for your patronising assistance.
The Devil: Incredible, insane feat of writing. Truly gets into the mind of his protag in a way that felt real, and organised the story in a compelling order. Neeeeded to find out how it ended. Didn't love how it ended.
A Family Happiness: at times turgid, but on a whole, fucking incredible story about a woman who falls in love with and a man and the grief that comes with having the fiery hot early love morph into a slower, maintainable, steady-marriage love.
I'm finding that Tolstoy is a genius at writing vivid characters, who are so real they remind you of yourself or people you know, putting them in relatable circumstances, and then perfectly showing you how they think.
December 19, 2008
I didn't much like A Landowner's Morning or The Devil, but Family Happiness was SO wonderfully depressing.
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July 8, 2011I didn't much enjoy The Devil, but I liked A Landowner's Morning and really like Family Happiness. Possibly one of the best Tolstoy stories I have read.
November 25, 2015
Really enjoyed this collection.
The Devil was by far the strongest of the three. There is something about Russian writers... they read into people better than others.
The Devil was by far the strongest of the three. There is something about Russian writers... they read into people better than others.
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March 9, 20183.5
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews