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sbrothy
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I'm currently "fighting" my way throgh Alexandra Tolstoj's biography of her father Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (The author of "War and Peace" among a ton of others). I say "fighting" because it's quite heavy and detailed, although the amount of information, both personal, historical and political more than makes up for it.
As was the case with Catherine the Great, Leo Tolstoj was also progressive in his political views, the management of his estate and - certainly not least - in his dealing with his family's serfs (we're talking, as perhaps you know, about an almost barbaric feudal despotic regime here). He actually tried to give "his" serfs their "freedom" which wasn't as welcome as one would think, many of them apparently couldn't imagine any other way of life and refused the "freedom".
Catherine the Great tried something similar but had to face the fact that the system simply wasn't prepared for it.
That also came a suprise to me. It's seems Catherine the Great perhaps wasn't as smart as she herself thought because some of the mails [Ed.: Heh, "mails". I mean of course "epistles".] she received from Voltaire made (IMHO) a little fun of her. Perhaps it went unnoticed or perhaps she was just too polite to say anything.
Also, Leo Tolstoj tried, using official channels, to institute a basic education for the masses, which wasn't a welcome idea among the plutocratic elite, to say the least! Nevertheless, he ran a school on his own property teaching poor farmer's children of all ages.
I'm quite impressed with the man!
As was the case with Catherine the Great, Leo Tolstoj was also progressive in his political views, the management of his estate and - certainly not least - in his dealing with his family's serfs (we're talking, as perhaps you know, about an almost barbaric feudal despotic regime here). He actually tried to give "his" serfs their "freedom" which wasn't as welcome as one would think, many of them apparently couldn't imagine any other way of life and refused the "freedom".
Catherine the Great tried something similar but had to face the fact that the system simply wasn't prepared for it.
That also came a suprise to me. It's seems Catherine the Great perhaps wasn't as smart as she herself thought because some of the mails [Ed.: Heh, "mails". I mean of course "epistles".] she received from Voltaire made (IMHO) a little fun of her. Perhaps it went unnoticed or perhaps she was just too polite to say anything.
Also, Leo Tolstoj tried, using official channels, to institute a basic education for the masses, which wasn't a welcome idea among the plutocratic elite, to say the least! Nevertheless, he ran a school on his own property teaching poor farmer's children of all ages.
I'm quite impressed with the man!
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