You May Die In Your Bed

Day 16 of A Year of War and Peace

We are now at the Rostov’s dinner table. The men’s side of the table vigorously discuss the declaration of war. The colonel, a German, demands fealty to the Russian Emperor and a swift victory against the French. Shinshin feels differently, asking why Russians should leave Russia to fight someone else’s war? Because of alliances, the colonel animatedly responds. How familiar is this debate? Seriously, it’s eerily similar to the type of international relations stories you might read about in today’s papers.

Nikolai, as a new hussar who will soon experience the war himself, is asked how he feels. He’s firmly in the colonel’s camp. Of course, he’s embarrassed by his response not so much because of its content but, rather, because of its emotional delivery which even he identifies as too charged for the social setting. We’ve talked about Nikolai’s emotional problems before. This isn’t the last we’ll see of them.

Before moving on I’d just like to note that in an essay about how and why to read War and Peace I wrote that one reason to read…