For 7/6/2021 (OUP p. 605)
Book 2: Part 5 Continued
Scene: January 1812, Moscow continued
Chapter 10
During intermission Anatole enters Helene’s box and Natasha is introduced to him. She feels both fascinated and uncomfortable under his gaze, and understands the fourth and last act of the opera even less as he flirts with her quite openly. Natasha thinks of her love for Andrei as sullied; its “former purity… perished” (608) but does not really understand why.
Chapter 11
Anatole is in Moscow because his father has insisted that he try one more time to court one of the wealthy matches (Julie and Marya) but he is only interested in the actresses and dancers–partly because he is already secretly married to a Polish girl in a shotgun marriage. Tolstoy calls him a “male Magdalene” making a terribly lopsided comparison: “All will be forgiven her, for she loved much; and all will be forgiven him, for he enjoyed much” (609). And he is hanging out with Dolokhov, who is back in Moscow after his obscure Persian mission.
Chapter 12
At Marya Dmitrievna’s, a rather festive Sunday is routinely being kept, but by the afternoon, a dressmaker comes to measure Natasha and Sonya for dresses while their godmother goes to see Andrei’s father (not able to get into his good graces, guessing by her dark mood when she gets home). As the grils are trying on outfits, Helene comes for a social visit and finds Natasha even more charming. She invites her to dinner at her house, and makes clear that this is on Anatole’s behest, and that he is quite smitten with her. When Natasha acts embarrassed, Helene says that even though she is engaged, she really needs to go out and not just sit around bored.
Chapter 13
Count Rostov takes Sonya and Natasha to Helene’s dinner party, but stays close by because he quickly discovers that the guests are people “known for the freedom of their conduct” (613). An opera singer performs, but Natasha can only pay attention to Anatole, who tells her while they are dancing an ecossaise that he loves her madly, and when Helene manipulates things so that the two of them are alone together, he kisses her, and she is very confused. She does not sleep and cannot figure out how to respond to the notion that she loves both Andrei and Anatole–she is confused and alarmed.
Chapter 14
Marya Dmitrievna reports that Andrei’s father shouted at her, and suggests that the family go back to the countryside. But Natasha has received a letter from Princess Marya apologizing for her father as an invalid old man, and asking Natasha to come see her again. Natasha cannot figure out how to answer, and as she is laboring over a draft, she receives a secret letter from Anatole (composed by Dolokhov, as Tolstoy’s narrator tells us, 618) asking her to run away with him. She thinks she loves him; she stays home that night when the others go to a dinner.
Chapter 15
When Sonya returns from the dinner, she finds Natasha asleep with the letter by her side, and when Natasha wakes up, she has read the letter and is appalled. Natasha says she feels completely under his spell as if she were “his slave” (619) and has no will. Sonya, however, questions his motive, especially the secrecy, and makes Natasha very angry by threatening to tell on her. Natasha writes to Princess Marya without a second thought, telling her that she cannot become Andrei’s wife. Meanwhile, the Rostov’s return to the country is delayed because the Count has to meet with a potential buyer of his estate; Sonya and Natasha fight more, because more secret letters come for Natasha, and Sonya suspects that Anatole will spirit Natasha away that night. She doesn’t know what to do, but she wants to protect the family and prove that she is on their side.
Chapter 16
Anatole, who is living with Dolokhov, has made elaborate plans for a sham marriage in the country, and then an elopement to Poland, with the help of the daring, crazy troika driver that he loves to hire, a man named Balaga, who loves to work for these two men and will ruin and even kill horses in order to do their bidding. Dolokhov, despite having helped to set the plan in motion, still warns Anatole: what will he do when his money runs out? Anatole doesn’t know or care.
Chapter 17
Dolokhov and Anatole give Balaga his orders and say goodbye to the “gypsy” girls (629) they live with. But when they get to Marya Dmitrievna’s, they walk into a trap, and are confronted by the enormous footman. They jump into the troika and flee.
Chapter 18
The backstory is that Sonya has confessed what she knew to Marya Dmitrievna, who promptly locks up Natasha, calling her a slut repeatedly and reproaching her multiple times, but also telling her she will keep this from the Count. When the Count comes back, everyone just says Natasha is ill, and he does not want to know more, just happy that his sale went well.
Chapter 19
Pierre, who has been staying away from seeing Natasha “because it seemed to him that his feeling for her was stronger than a married man’s should be for his friends’ fiancée” (633), is summoned to Marya Dmitrievna’s (he sees Anatole, “fresh and rosy” and not particularly concerned about anything, in passing on the way). Marya tells him what has happened and he is very disappointed in Natasha, concluding that all women are like Helene. Pierre is supposed to convince her that Anatole will not call on Natasha as she expects, and that he had evil intentions (he knows of the secret Polish marriage). But even when she hears it from Pierre, Natasha just reacts by sending everyone away.
Chapter 20
Pierre seeks out Anatole and finally finds him in his own home, with Helene. He confronts him and demands all the letters he has received from her as well as complete silence about the entire affair, and makes him leave Petersburg by giving him money to leave.
Chapter 21
Pierre returns to Marya Dmitrievna’s to give her the letters and we find out in two sentences that Natasha has attempted to commit suicide with arsenic, was rescued in time because she told Sonya, and is now very ill (!!!!! no big deal????? 639). A few days later he hears from Andrei that he has finally arrived in Moscow and goes to see him. It is very clear to him that Andrei has already made up his mind that Natasha’s refusal via his sister is final and that he would not consider forgiving her, a “fallen woman” (641). Pierre can also tell that Andrei’s sister Marya seems very happy that the match has fallen through.
Chapter 22
Pierre goes to see Natasha again, since she insists on seeing him. She asks him to ask Andrei to forgive her, even though she is very clear-eyed that “all is over” between them (643) and that she is forever ruined. Pierre tells her “If I were not myself, but the handsomest, cleverest, and best man in the world, and were free, I would this moment ask on my knees for our hand and your love” BUT THAT’S A LOT OF IFS (644). When he leaves to go home he looks up at the night sky and see “the enormous and brilliant comet of the year 1812” (which is really the comet of 1811, the tail of which was already fading by early 1812), thinking it responds “to what was passing in his own softened and uplifted soul, now blossoming into a new life” (644).
Book 3: Part 1
Chapter 1
Back to history, but in theoretical form first: It’s 1812, and war is about to break out again with Napoleon’s march on Moscow. The narrator reflects sweepingly on the multicausality of war and on counterfactuals (what if Napoleon had not tried to march on Moscow), and tries to hash out the free will vs. fate / determinism question in 2 pages.
Chapter 2
Now for the actual history of dates and events. In June 1812, Napoleon crosses from Poland to Russia across the river Niemen. The idea of conquering “the East” is key to this unusual step. His army adores him, and a regiment of Polish Uhlans that has been ordered to ford the river asks for permission to swim across at a deeper spot, even though a number of soldiers and horses drown that way for no reason except enthusiasm for Napoleon. Tolstoy does not approve–chapter ends with: Quos vult perdere dementat (Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad, sometimes given in Latin as Quos Deus vult perdere, prius dementat).