War and Peace

by Leo Tolstoy

Extraordinary Quotations from the 1968 Signet Classic Edition

pp 237
• "Who are these men?" Rostov wondered, unable to believe his eyes. "Can they be the French? …Can they be coming to me? Really coming to me? And why? To kill me? Me whom everyone loves?" He recalled his mother’s love for him, the love of his family and his friends, and the intention of the enemy to kill him seemed impossible. "But perhaps—they are going to kill me!"…He grasped his pistol, but instead of firing, flung it at the Frenchman and ran with all his might toward the bushes.
  pp 298-300
• Rostov…described the Schongraben action exactly as men who have taken part in battles generally do describe them, that is, as they would like them to have been, as they have heard them described by others, and making them sound more glorious, and quite unlike what they actually were. Rostov was a truthful young man and would on no account have told a deliberate lie. He began with the intention of relating everything exactly as it happened, but imperceptibly, unconsciously, and inevitably, he slipped into falsehood….He could not tell them simply that everyone had set out at a trot, that he had fallen from his horse, sprained his arm, and then had run from a Frenchman into the woods as fast as his legs would carry him.
  pp 300
• "And I will say this to you," Prince Andrei cut him [Rostov] short in a tone of quiet authority, "you wish to insult me, and I am quite prepared to agree that it would not be difficult to do so, should you be deficient in self-respect; but you will agree that the time and place are exceedingly ill-chosen…You know my name and where to find me. But bear in mind," he added, "that I do not consider either myself or you as having been insulted, and my advice, as a man older than you, is to let the matter drop. Au revoir.
  pp 358-359
• Indeed, everything seemed to him [Prince Andrei] so futile and insignificant in comparison with that solemn and sublime train of thought which weakness, loss of blood, suffering, and the nearness of death had induced in him. Looking into Napoleon’s eyes, Prince Andrei thought of the insignificance of greatness, the unimportance of life, which no one could understand, and of the still greater unimportance of death, the meaning of which no living person could understand and explain…There is nothing certain, nothing except the nothingness of everything that is comprehensible to me, and the greatness of something incomprehensible but all-important!"
  p 402
• "Yes, my dear friend, he continued, "I have met loving, noble, high-minded men, but I have yet to meet a woman—be she countess or cook—who is not venal. I have never yet found that angelic purity and devotion that I seek in a woman. If I were to find such a woman, I would give my life for her, But those----" he made a gesture of contempt. "An believe me, if I still value life it is only because I still hope to met such a divine creature, who would regenerate, purify, and elevate me. But you don’t understand this."[Dolokhov to Nikolai Rostov]
  p 465
• "I know only two real misfortunes in life: remorse and sickness. The only good is the absence of these evils. To live for myself, avoiding these two evils, is my whole philosophy now." [Prince Andrei to Pierre Bezukhov]
  pp 508-509
• At the edge of the road stood an oak….Evidently some of its branches had long ago been broken off and its bark cicatrized. With its huge ungainly limbs sprawling unsymmetrically like gnarled arms and fingers, it stood, an ancient monster, wrathful and sardonic, among the smiling birches. Thgis oak alone refused to yield to the season’s spell, spurning both spring and sunshine. "Spring and love and happiness!" this oak seemed to say. "Are you not weary of that same senseless, inane delusion?"…"Yes, that oak is right, a thousand times right," mused Prince Andrei. "Let others, the young, be snared anew by that delusion, but we know life—our life is over!"…He considered his life afresh as it were and arrived at the same hopeless but soothing conclusion as before, that it was not for him to begin anything anew, but that he must live out his life harming no one, disturbed by nothing, desiring nothing.
  pp 512
• The old oak, completely transformed by a mantle of dark green, sappy foliage, stood rapt and slightly swaying in the rays of the evening sun. The gnarled fingers, the scars, the old anguish and mistrust were no more to be seen. Through the rough, century-old bark, even where there were no twigs, young leaves had burgeoned such as one could hardly believe this aged creature could put forth…."No, life is not over at thirty-one!" Prince Andrei decided impulsively, finally, and irrevocably. "It is not enough for me to know all that I have in me—everyone must know: Pierre, and that young girl who wanted to fly away into the sky—everyone must know me so that my life may not be lived for myself alone, while others, like that girl, live so apart from it: it must be lived so that it may b e reflected in all of them, so that they may share my life with me!"
  p 522
• Had Speransky belonged to the same world as Prince Andrei, had he possessed the same breeding and moral traditions, Bolkonsky would soon have detected the weak, human, unheroic side of his character; as it was, what appeared to him to be Speransky’s singular and logical turn of mind inspired him with respect the more because he did not fully understand it.
  p 559
• In Natasha’s eyes all the people at the ball were good, kind, splendid people, loving one another and incapable of offending one another, so they ought to be happy.
  p 564
• The whole family, which Prince Andrei had once judged severely, now seemed to him to consist of excellent, simple, kindly people. The hospitality and good nature of the old Count, which in Petersburg struck one as particularly gracious, were such that Prince Andrei could not refuse to stay to dinner….What a treasure they possess in Natasha; however, they are good, kind, and form the best possible background for this remarkably poetic, enchanting girl, who is bubbling with life!"
  p 565
• "I must make the most of my liberty while I feel such youth and vitality in me," he [Prince Andrei] said to himself. "Pierre was right when he said one must believe in the possibility of happiness in order to be happy, and now I do believe in it. Let the dead bury their dead; while one has life one must live and be happy!" he thought.
  pp 566
• "My former comrades are still nothing, while I am only waiting for a vacancy to be made a regimental commander, and I have the happiness of being your husband." (He rose and kissed Vera’s hand, stopping on the way to straighten a turned-up corner of the carpet.)…Vera, judging by her husband [Berg] alone and generalizing from her observations of him, supposed that all men, while being selfish, conceited, and utterly devoid of understanding, ascribed common sense to none but themselves.
  
• "I should never have believed it if anyone had told me I could love like this," he said. "it is not like anything I ever felt before. The whole world is divided into two halves for me now: one is she [Natasha], and there all is joy, hope, light; the other is where she is not, and there all is gloom and darkness…"…"Darkness and gloom," Pierre repeated. "Yes, yes, I understand that." …The brighter Prince Andrei’s fate appeared to him, the darker seemed his own.
  p 632
• Standing as usual in the middle of the ballroom and choosing the place where the resonance was best, Natasha began to sing her mother’s favorite song. She had said she did not feel like singing, but it was long since she had sung, and long before she again sang, as she did that evening. Dimmler, who had seated himself beside the Countess, listened with closed eyes. "Ah, Countess," he said at last, "that is a European talent; she has nothing to learn: that tenderness, sweetness, power…" "Oh, how afraid I am for her, how afraid I am!" said the Countess, not realizing to whom she was speaking. Her maternal instinct told her that there was too much of something in Natasha, and that because of it she would not be happy.
  p 659
• Prince Nikolai Andreich grew more animated and expressed his views on the impending war…Bonaparte is concerned the only thing is to have an armed frontier and a firm policy, and he will never again dare to cross the Russian border, as he did in 1807."
  pp 686-687
• Anatol was always content with his position, with himself, and with others….He believed that just as a duck had been created to live in water, so God had created him to spend thirty thousand a year and always to occupy a prominent position in society….All that he cared about was pleasure and women; according to his ideas there was nothing ignoble in these tastes, and as he was incapable of considering what the gratification of his desires entailed for others, he was quite sincere in regarding himself as an irreproachable man, felt genuine contempt for wrongdoers and scoundrels, and with a clear conscience held his head high. Rakes, those male Magdalens, cherish a secret belief in their own innocence similar to that of female Magdalens, and based on the same hope of forgiveness. "All will be forgiven her, for she loved much; all will be forgiven him, for he enjoyed much."
  p 687,
• Dolokhov, who needed Anatol Kuragin’s name, position, and connections as a decoy to lure rich young men into his gambling circle, made use of him and amused himself at his expense without letting him suspect it. Apart from the advantage he derived from Anatol, the very process of dominating another’s will was in itself a pleasure, a habit, and a necessity for Dolokhov.
  pp 721-722
• Pierre discerned in his friend that need which he himself knew only too well: to become aroused and argue about some extraneous matter in order to stifle personal thoughts that were too painful. [on the occasion of Pierre’s telling Prince Andrei of Natasha’s suicide attempt following the foiled elopement with Anatol] "She is very ill," said Pierre. "Then she is still here?" said Prince Andrei. "And Prince Kuragin?" he asked quickly. "He went away some time ago. She has been at death’s door…" "I am very sorry to hear of her illness," said Prince Andrei, with a disagreeable cold, malicious smile that reminded one of his father.
  

Copyright 1998, Herman Fontenot

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