Anna Karenin - Leo Tolstoy

Anna Karenin, which Tolstoy began in 1873, has been called the greatest of all novels – surpassing in humanity even the earlier War and Peace. In this tragedy of a fashionable woman who abandons husband, son, and social position for a passionate liaison which finally drives her to suicide, Tolstoy has in addition given us, in the character of Levin, a true reflection of himself and his tortured search for the meaning of life. For the Penguin Classics Rosemary Edmonds has rendered into fluent English Tolstoy’s great canvas of contemporary Russian life, with its deep and varied insight into human nature.