1910. Anna Karenina and War and Peace have made Leo Tolstoy the world's most famous author. But fame comes at a price. In the tumultuous final year of his life, Tolstoy is desperate to find respite, so leaves his large family and the hounding press behind and heads into the wilderness. Too ill to venture beyond the tiny station of Astapovo, he believes his last days will pass in peaceful isolation. But the battle for Tolstoy's soul will not be so simple.
The Reviews
A subtle masterpiece.Times Literary Supplement
A modern classic and an unforgettable portrait of Russia on the cusp of revolution.
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Paperback
384 pages
Price: £7.99
ISBN: 9781847677754 Other editions
Paperback
Jay Parini, a novelist and poet, is Axinn Professor of English at Middlebury College in Vermont. His six novels include The Last Station, Benjamin's Crossing and The Apprentice Lover. His volumes of poetry include The Art of Subtraction: New and Selected Poems. In addition to biographies of John Steinbeck, Robert Frost, and William Faulkner, he has written a volume of essays on literature and politics as well as The Art of Teaching. He edited the Oxford Encyclopedia of American Literature and writes regularly for the Guardian and other publications.
