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The Sebastopol Sketches (Penguin Classics)

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What can I say after this great previous review by a reader from Dayton, OH? It is true, in this book Tolstoy was a little bit obsessed about revealing the characters' vanity and feigned bravery, but he also did not conceal the other side of war experience:

"He truly would have become a hero, if from P. he had gotten straight onto the bastions, but now he needed to go through a great deal of moral tribulations in order to mould into that calm, patient man, in toil and danger, the kind of man we are used to seeing in a Russian officer. But it was already too hard to revive enthusiasm in him." (Sevastopol in August 1855, Chapter 5, last paragraph")

Tolstoy shows here that eventually a lot of Russian officers get used to the danger and nearness of death and consequently become more at peace with themselves and vain no more. So there was objectivity in his reasoning! There was another episode in "Sevastopol in May 1855" about a naval officer who had gone through the same stages to become that "calm, patient" type.

I regard "Sevastopol" as a much better piece of prose than "Childhood, Boyhood and Youth", esp. "May" and "August". The descriptions are sometimes so realistic and characters so alive that one feels his/her personal involvement, you feel like "you're there"! The ugliness of war becomes vividly indelible, our moral obligation for peace and Christian love is put forth with as the only humanly acceptable option and as the previous reviewer noticed, you can see one of the greatest novelists ever, emerging on the literary field.

I really think that "Sevastopol" as well as a number of his other stories about war (The Invaders", "Cutting of the Forest", etc.) were a preparation for his giant "War and Peace". As any talented writer, or artist, rather, Tolstoy grew as he created and so he could not stop until he could fully realize himself and create something equal to his stature, something as beautiful and live as life itself, as opposed to something ugly and terrifying as war and death. All that was accomplished in "War and Peace", so if you like "Sevastopol" and the like, welcome to the world of "War and Peace": you will be fully gratified!

PS By the way, I read "Sevastopol" in Russian, and it was the uncensored (!) version. See, what happened was that in 1855-56 the censors cut out a great deal of the most poignant, critical text, without which the work became a literary cripple. Only years after that was it restored to its original condition. This "Penguin" edition seems to be not only very informative about the background of the work, but the translation is based on the CORRECT original version, and, of course, David McDuff did a wonderful translation job. "Penguin" is not known for durability of its copies, but in this case I highly recommend this particular translation. The difference between the correct and censored versions is outrageous! For example, in "Sevastopol in August" (see "Penguin/David McDuff" version), there is chapter 5 about a cowardly officer from P. In the other translations it is completely cut out! Of course, it is not the translators' fault. I could go on and on about it, but it is not necessary. I just want you to read the right stuff:)

The young Tolstoy took part in the defence of Sebastopol (1854-55) during the Crimean War, and these sketches (parts of which were written under fire) record his impressions of the drama and tumult of war. The first sketch, "Sebastopol in December" was published anonymously and attracted the attention of Tsar Alexander II and Turgenev. It is a short, emotionally patriotic piece recording the author's empathetic reaction to the bravery of the ordinary soldiers and sailors during the siege. "Sebastopol in May" is more ambitious and more ambiguous, recording the experiences of a group of Russian officers during an attack by the Allies on the 4th bastion of the defences, a position dreaded by everyone on the Russian side. There are no heroes in this piece, says Tolstoy, except "truth," as he depicts flawed human beings struggle to reconcile their petty vanities with the "higher" duties that have brought them to that terrible place. The final sketch, "Sebastopol in August," records the fall of Sebastopol through the eyes of the doomed Kozeltsov brothers and features some of the finest battle descriptions I have ever read. Tolstoy published it openly under his own name, and it seems to have helped him finally to choose literature rather than the army for his future career. "The Sebastopol Sketches" is a marvellous book not only for its own merits but also for the insight it gives us into a literary master trying out his wings for the first time.

In 1855, Tolstoy was a soldier in the Crimean War and a witness to many atrocities. One that would stay with him was the image of two children killed in a shelling. His experiences during the war made up the contents of his work The Sebastopol Sketches, many of which he drafted on the battlefield.

The book is divide in three short stories stem from Tolstoy's military experience during the Crimean War: "Sebastopol in December," "Sebastopol in May," and "Sebastopol in August 1855."

During this time, the young Tolstoy gave himself over to the decadent life that was common for men of his class, catching a venereal disease as well as drinking heavily and sustaining enormous gambling debts which included the loss of some of his prized property at Yasnaya.

I really enjoy reading this book,Tolstoy's reactions to the fighting at Sebastopol are really crude, if you are interesting in The Crimean War but from the Russian side you may find what you are looking for in this great book

It was during the writing of this book that Tolstoy discovered his gift for prose. That's what makes this such a terrifically interesting and satisfying read.

It is quite immature in places, and it focuses almost obsessively on the fact the people are egotistical and that war is usually not at all heroic. In fact, it gets downright tiring and predictable in places because Tolstoy, in this book, is continually compelled to record his musings on the motivations of his characters, and those motivations invariably involve being awarded medals or recognition by "aristocrats."

Tolstoy, at this stage, apparently thought this was a phenomenon of his age and place (he hadn't yet been to Europe), which is surprising and disappointing. Yet throughout the book one finds passages and even entire chapters so rich in detail and nuance, so journalistic and at the same time artistic, so full of compassion and anger, that one understands immediately Tolstoy's potential as one of the greatest authors ever (the description of the death of Praskukhin ranks as some of the most awesome literature I've ever read).

He states that his book has no villians, and neither has it any heros, save for one: The truth. Occasionally fanciful and speculative passages notwithstanding, I have no doubts that this is so.

When, in 1854, the Crimean War broke out between Russia and an alliance that included France, Britain, and the Ottomans, Leo Tolstoy (then 25) was undecided as to his career, with writing and the military exerting the strongest claims. In October 1854 the Russian forces won a significant victory at Balaclava (site of the "Charge of the Light Brigade"), but a month later they suffered a major defeat at Inkerman, and they withdrew to the Black Sea port of Sevastopol, to which the Allied forces laid siege for almost a year. Within Russia, the defense of Sevastopol became the focal point of the nation's attentions, with many would-be patriots volunteering to go there and serve the Tsar and Mother Russia and in the process win glory for themselves, Leo Tolstoy included.

Between December 1854 and September 1855, when Sevastopol finally fell to the siege, Tolstoy spent much time in and around the city as an artillery officer. What he saw and experienced further inflamed within him two strong sentiments that he already harbored -- "a fierce and aggressive patriotism" and a correspondingly intense critical despair over the inefficiencies and deficiencies of the Russian military organization. Those impulses spurred him to write, while still serving in the army, three separate "sketches" of the Siege of Sevastopol as it played out over time - the first set in December 1854, the second in May 1855, and the third in September 1855. The first two were published anonymously but the third was published over Tolstoy's name. On the whole, the Sketches were well received within Russia and their favorable reception and the process of writing them convinced Tolstoy that his true vocation was as a writer. He later remarked, "I failed to become a general in the army, but I became one in literature."

THE SEBASTOPOL SKETCHES correspond closely to actual events, but they are fictionalized, in an increasingly greater degree from the first to the third. (Curiously, to me their intrinsic merit or quality declines slightly from first to third.) According to the Introduction to this volume, "Tolstoy has sometimes been called the first modern war correspondent," but the overt fictionalization is at odds with what we currently think journalism to be. Nonetheless, the SKETCHES - especially the accounts of the soldier's ordeal under relentless bombardment and the descriptions of the blood, gore, and amputated limbs of field hospitals - convey to the reader (even one of today but surely more so to the Russian reader of the 1850s) the horror, atrocities, and ultimate senselessness of mechanized war. "[Y]ou will see war not as a beautiful, orderly, and gleaming formation, with music and beaten drums, streaming banners and generals on prancing horses, but war in its authentic expression - as blood, suffering, and death." At one point Tolstoy writes about a soldier unable to recall the details of his fighting at the center of a successful repulse of a French assault because the entire time he had been "lost in a fog of oblivion" -- and is that the first such metaphoric use of fog?

But what most intrigues me about THE SEBASTOPOL SKETCHES is the strong undercurrent of pacifism, Tolstoy's fierce patriotism notwithstanding. He opens the second sketch with the thought experiment, "what if one of the warring sides were to propose to the other that each should dismiss one soldier from its ranks?", with each then continuing to reduce its forces one by one until each had only one soldier left. "[I]f it still appeared that the really complex disputes arising between the rational representatives of rational creatures must be settled by combat, let the fighting be done by these two soldiers: one could lay siege to the town, and the other could defend it." After all, Tolstoy goes on to note, settling a dispute with tens of thousands killed and maimed on each side has no more logical force behind it than settling it based on the death of one of only two combatants. As appealing as this proposal might be, it is of course overly simplistic in several respects. But Tolstoy follows it up with an observation that cannot be easily dismissed, whether in 1855 or now: "One of two things appears to be true: either war is madness, or, if men perpetrate this madness, they thereby demonstrate that they are far from being the rational creatures we for some reason commonly suppose them to be."

Occasionally melodrama and cliché creep into the SKETCHES, but on the whole the writing is quite distinguished (especially for a writer still in his twenties) and it is surprisingly modern for something written over 150 years ago. It is understated, relatively informal, often lyrical and often gently ironic, and it abounds with some wonderfully descriptive passages. SKETCHES doesn't quite strike me as a 5-star work, but it is a noteworthy early effort of one of the greatest of writers.

As a first work (one of the first), these sketches bear the identifying marks of a genius in the beginning of his career.

What better place to start, and what more challenging scene, than the defeat of the Russians by the British and French at Sevestopol during the same war that brought us "The Charge of the light Brigade" from the other side.

This is obviously written by a man who had been in War, and had experiences the combination of fear, duty, and bravery that it takes to survive. The world has suffered through several more senseless wars since then, but few stories capture the truth of it all better than these.

For readers who enjoy War and Peace, The Sebastopol Sketches provides interesting insight not only in the military career of the author, Count Leo Tolstoy, but gives ample evidence of where he found the human experience to make such a classic novel. The book is set during the Crimean War in 1854-55, when Tolstoy was a 25-year-old artillery officer. A 31-page introduction by David McDuff lays out the background of Count Leo Toltsoy's life, his entrance into the Russian Army and the beginning of the Crimean War. This introduction is well-written and informative. The sketches are divided into three chapters.

December 1854
This opening section is the shortest, at only 16 pages, and covers a brief visit that Tolstoy made to Sebastopol in search of supplies for his battery on 5 December 1854. Tolstoy was a very keen observer of detail and although brief, this section acts as a "you-are-there" sort of tour of the city, from the harbor quays out to one of the bastions. Here, Tolstoy makes several interesting observations, such as noting the conversations of several gunners and remarking that, "a feeling...of savage hatred for the enemy, and a wish to have revenge on him, a feeling that lurks in the soul of every human being." Tolstoy was also impressed with the Russian character, claiming that, "the strength of the Russian people cannot possibly ever falter, no matter in what part of the world it may be put to the test." This is the kind of tough talk of a chauvinistic young officer in love with his country, but one wonders what Tolstoy thought of his earlier writing when he lived long enough to see Russian arms humiliated in Manchuria in 1905.

May 1855
In Tolstoy's second visit to Sebastopol, he initially focuses on a card game between several Russian officers (Tolstoy was an inveterate gambler, himself). This provides a useful literary device for sketching several "types" of Russian officers of the period. For example, one snobbish noble officer exclaims, "I really don't see how men in dirty underwear, suffering from lice and not even able to wash their hands, can possibly be capable of bravery." This is interesting commentary on how Russian upper-crust officers viewed the enlisted men who doing most of the fighting and dying (this theme appears again in War and Peace). Then, Tolstoi shifts as the card game ends and several officers make their way by a casualty dressing station, with them witnessing the suffering of these "dirty" enlisted soldiers. Later, Tolstoy notes the removal of dead Russian soldiers, and one of the characters says, "What a God-awful stink! That was all that remained of this man in the land of the living." Tolstoy makes interesting comment along the way, noting that "once fear has found its way into the soul, it does not readily give way to any other emotion." Indeed, there are no heroes in this account (Tolstoy says, my hero is truth), and Tolstoy describes junior Russian lieutenants as, "each is a little Napoleon, a little monster ready to start a conflict and kill a hundred or so men simply in order to obtain another star or an increase of a third in his pay." The second section is 50 pages long and begins a shift towards a more critical view of warfare.

August 1855
This 73-page section is told through the eyes a Lieutenant Kozeltsov, a seasoned officer who returns to Sebastopol after being wounded. Kozeltsov is a common-sense fellow, not high-born and is the kind of protagonist Tolstoy enjoys using as his narrative vehicle and to demonstrate the true Russian warrior (similar to the artillery captain in War and Peace). Sebastopol has changed greatly in the past eight months, with heavy damage from artillery fire and "all the pubs are closed ...its as cheerful as a morgue." This suggests a change from the carefree, adventurous view of war in the opening sections to a sober, war-is-hell-and-carnage' view. Kozeltsov is eventually sent out with his unit to one of the bastions under fire and we see that his relationship with his troops is quite good. He is up front with them in a bunker, not back in the rear playing cards and bad-mouthing them. Not all the officers up front are of the same caliber and Tolstoy notes those who display fake bravery, or stupid conceited bravery and those who are apathetic - sort of the bell curve of warfare. This section ends with a major French attack on the bastion, with dire consequences for the inhabitants (similar to the defense of the Raevsky Redoubt in War and Peace).

Penguin provides two maps in this edition, one of the Crimea and one of Sebastopol itself. Overall, the Sebastopol sketches is an excellent literary and historical effort and clearly written by someone who has experienced both the giddy exuberance and horror of war firsthand.

It is great that so many people are interested in the history of this city, but you are all spelling it wrong! The correct spelling is "Sevastopol", and "Sebastopol" is just a crazy American adaptation of it. The actual word is pronounced with a soft "L".

P.S. This is an AMAZING city to visit! I went there the summer before last, and had a wonderful time.
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