The Devil and Other Stories

Name: The Devil and Other Stories
Brand: Recorded Books
Availability: InStock
Author: Leo Tolstoy
ISBN: 9781490618951

Author: Leo Tolstoy, Richard F. Gustafson

Narrator: Kevin R. Free, George Guidall, T. Ryder Smith, Suzanne Toren

Unabridged: 12 hr 45 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 06/06/2014

Categories: Fiction, Classic

Synopsis

This collection of eleven stories spans virtually the whole of Tolstoy's creative life. While each is unique in form, as a group they are representative of his style, and touch on the central themes that surface in War and Peace and Anna Karenina. Stories as different as "The Snowstorm", "Lucerne", "The Diary of a Madman", and "The Devil" are grounded in autobiographical experience. They deal with journeys of self-discovery and the moral and religious thought that characterizes Tolstoy's works of criticism and philosophy. "Strider" and "Father Sergy", as well as reflecting Tolstoy's own experiences, also reveal profound psychological insights. These stories range over much of the nineteenth-century Russian world, from the nobility to the peasantry, the military to the clergy, from merchants and cobblers to a horse and a tree. Together they present a fascinating picture of Tolstoy's skill and artistry. About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

About Leo Tolstoy

Leo Tolstoy was born in 1828 at Yasnaya Polyana in central Russia and educated privately. He studied Oriental languages and law at the University of Kazan, then led a life of dissipation until 1851, when he went to the Caucasus and joined an artillery regiment. He took part in the Crimean War, and on the basis of this experience wrote The Sevastopol Stories, which confirmed his tenuous reputation as a writer.

After a period in St. Petersburg and abroad, where he studied educational methods for use in his school for peasant children at Yasnaya Polyana, Tolstoy married Sofya Behrs in 1862. The next fifteen years was a period of great happiness: the couple had thirteen children, and Tolstoy managed his estates, continued his educational projects, and wrote War and Peace and Anna Karenina.

A Confession marked a spiritual crisis in Tolstoy's life; he became an extreme moralist, and in a series of pamphlets written after 1880, he expressed his rejection of state and church, indictment of the weaknesses of the flesh, and denunciation of private property. He published his last novel, Resurrection, in 1900.

Tolstoy's teaching earned him many followers at home and abroad, but also much opposition, and in 1901 he was excommunicated by the Russian Orthodox Church. He died in 1910.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Ana on January 01, 2018

The Snow Storm - the unnamed narrator of the story, his manservant and a driver start on an evening trip risking freezing to death. (2 stars) Lucerne - the narrator tired of his English companions and meets an itinerant singer in Lucerne. (4 stars) Three Deaths - narrates the deaths of three subjects:......more

Goodreads review by Ivy-Mabel on July 28, 2023

In my view Tolstoy is an absolutely brilliant writer and this collection of his short stories shows his versatility. Some of the stories seem autobiographical, some religious or philosophical, some critical of the society of Tolstoy's day and some analyse 'the human condition'. Something for everyon......more

Goodreads review by Paul on March 05, 2022

Many years ago, I read "The Death of Ivan Ilyich" and a couple of Tolstoy's other late-career short stories, but had never gotten around to reading all of his short fiction. Somewhat to my surprise, these are not exactly inessential juvenalia; most of the stories were written at the height of his po......more

Goodreads review by Phrodrick slowed his growing backlog on March 20, 2019

The stories collected in The Devil and Other Sorties may cross much of Count Leo Tolstoy’s’ literary life. The themes in each seem to carry too much of his later conclusions that fiction should be written for the peasants and be little more than restatements of existing traditions and promote specif......more

Goodreads review by Monique on January 27, 2016

As pessoas não aspiram a fazer da vida o que consideram bom, mas a chamar de "minhas" o maior número de coisas [...] e aquele que diz "meu" para o maior número de coisas é considerado o mais feliz, segundo esse jogo. Para quê isso, não sei, mas é assim. Conto: kholstomér. Não me canso de Tolstói. Sej......more