Hacker News Reader

Comment by globuous | Hacker News Reader

If you liked war and peace, you should check out grossman’s life and fate, it’s WWII’s version, fantastic. And blacklisted by the soviet government because critical of it.

View on HN

I don’t understand how people don’t like War and Peace, aside from its size and the weird discursive turns he takes in the appendices. I’ve read it three times and every time it’s a page-turner. So good. But Tolstoy was an infinitely better literary artist than Dostoevsky could ever hope to be. (Tolstoy’s novella, Hadji Murad, is 100 pages of literary crystal, cleverly concealing itself from you as you look on through the transparent glass of words into the world Tolstoy points out to you, until you realize the whole thing is just Tolstoy and his astonishing talent).

But Dostoevsky had the real big heart, and I love him for it.

I don’t understand how people don’t like War and Peace

Easy, try mandatory-reading it in the summer when you’re around 15. I told my teacher that I will not do it and I don’t care what comes with it.

War and Peace starts pretty slow. It took me a long time to get through the first 100 pages or so. Once I was into it, I couldn't put it down, but it took a while to get there.

I don’t think you can objectively say Tolstoy was a worse literary artist than Dostoyevsky.

For me it’s absolutely the other way around. Dostoyevsky saw into men’s souls in a way no other writer perhaps barring Shakespeare could. Tolstoy for me is more mechanically or technically good, but Dostoyevsky was a true artist and saw through life and humanity at another level.

That's what they said

> But Tolstoy was an infinitely better literary artist than Dostoevsky could ever hope to be.

Right. Dostoevsky was perfect on the human element. Tolstoy on the writing.

Definitely looking forward to reading this soon. Thanks for recommending it, friend!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com