Russian Author Leo Tolstoy On This Day in History

This day in history: Russian author Leo Tolstoy was born on this day in 1828. Tolstoy is best remembered for his massive masterpiece novels, Anna Karenina and War and Peace (1869). Writers from Dostoevsky to Virginia Woolf declared Tolstoy “the greatest of all novelists.” Yet he wrote more of political philosophy than he did of fiction, his views being a sort of libertarian-anarchism with a healthy distaste of government power and revolution. He wrote: "In all history there is no war which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious even when successful."

Also: "All violence consists in some people forcing others, under threat of suffering or death, to do what they do not want to do."

"In our world everybody thinks of changing humanity, and nobody thinks of changing himself."

"Not only does the action of Governments not deter men from crimes; on the contrary, it increases crime by always disturbing and lowering the moral standard of society."

"Government is violence, Christianity is meekness, non-resistance, love. And, therefore, government cannot be Christian, and a man who wishes to be a Christian must not serve government."

"The truth is that the State is a conspiracy designed not only to exploit, but above all to corrupt its citizens … Henceforth, I shall never serve any government anywhere."

He also worked on the New Testament by simply rewriting it, and he was excommunicated from the Russian Orthodox Church for rejecting religious rituals.

Tolstoy on War and State By Vasko Kohlmayer
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2011/12/vasko-kohlmayer/tolstoy-on-war-and-state/

"First Tolstoy, then Dostoyevsky. First antidote, then poison"
Philologist Lev Sobolev about why the ideas of Leo Tolstoy are still relevant
https://realnoevremya.com/articles/3002-interview-with-lev-sobolev-about-leo-tolstoy

Read: The Gospel In Brief by Tolstoy at
https://archive.org/details/GospelInBrief_LevTolstoy
Read: War and Peace at
https://archive.org/details/leotolstoyswarpe01bloo/page/n6
Read: Anna Karenina at https://archive.org/details/anna_k/page/n8

Watch Anna Karenina at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMrCMYcyS44 and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hM2t7YSgAC4
Listen to the Anna Karenina audiobook at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kjWJjtMwuQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5o2nH027rc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJJSuwiej4Q

Also: 12 Quotes from Leo Tolstoy on Truth, Violence, and Government
https://fee.org/articles/12-quotes-from-leo-tolstoy-on-truth-violence-and-government/

Also: Tolstoyan movement
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tolstoyan_movement