. It is interesting to compare the autobiography of S. A. T. with Tolstoy’s play And Light Shines in Darkness. In this Marie Ivanovna, a character taken from S. A. T., uses the family, children, house, and so on, as the chief arguments against the attempts of Nikolai Ivanovich to arrange their life in accordance with his views. She says: “I have to bring them up, feed them, bear them…. I don’t sleep at nights, I nurse, I keep the whole house….” And the husband “wishes to give everything away…. He wants me at my time of life to become a cook, washerwoman.” See Act I, scenes xix and xx; Act II, scene ii.
. L. D. Urusov, died 6, October, 1885, a devoted friend and enthusiastic follower of Tolstoy. When he died in the Crimea, where he had gone with Tolstoy, Urusov, according to Countess A. A. Tolstoy, left to his son who was with him Tolstoy’s letters, as the greatest treasures which he was leaving him. See Tolstovskii Musei, Vol. II; L. N. Tolstoy’s Correspondence with N. N. Strakhov; L. N. Tolstoy’s Letters to his Wife, pages 255-266.
. Tolstoy lost his suit-case, containing MSS., books, and proofs, in 1883 on his way to Yasnaya Polyana. Among the lost MSS. were several chapters of In What do I Believe? which Tolstoy had to rewrite. Biryukov, Biography, Vol. II, pages 457-8.
. Another allusion to Chertkov, who in the middle of the ‘eighties began taking Tolstoy’s MSS. to England.
. Tolstoy himself translated this work from the Greek, and twice wrote a preface to it, in 1885 and 1905. See L. N. Tolstoy’s Diary, 1895-1899, edited by V. G. Ghertkov, second edition, Moscow, 1916, page 46.
. As far as we know, this translation has not been published.
. Her letter to the Metropolitan Antonius of 26 February, 1901, copies of which were sent to the other Metropolitans and to the Attorney to the Synod. The letter and the answer of the Metropolitan Antonius were published in many newspapers.
. A short article in the form of a letter to the editor, on Leonid Andreyev on the appearance of Burenin’s critical Sketches in Novoe Vremya, 1903. At the time it attracted great attention in the press owing to the exceptional bitterness with which S. A. T. attacked Andreyev and in general all modern novelists. She wrote: “One would like to continue M. Burenin’s splendid article, adding ever more ideas of the same kind, raising higher and higher the standard for artistic purity and moral power in contemporary literature. Works of Messieurs Andreyevs ought not to be read, nor glorified, nor sold out, but the whole Russian public ought to rise in indignation against the dirt which in thousands of copies is being spread over Russia by a cheap journal and by repeated editions of publishers who encourage them.
If Maxim Gorky, undoubtedly a clever and gifted writer from the people, introduces a good deal of cynicism and nudeness into the scenes in which he paints the life of a certain class, one always, nevertheless, feels in them a sincere sorrow for all the evil and suffering which is endured by the poor, ignorant, and drunken of fallen humanity. In the works of Maxim Gorky one can always dwell on some character or pathetic moment in which, one feels, the author, grieving for the fallen, has a clear knowledge of what is evil and what good, and he loves the good.
But in Andreyev’s stories one feels that he loves and takes delight in the baseness in the phenomena of vicious human life, and with that love of vice he infects the undeveloped, the reading public which, as M. Burenin says, is untidy morally, and the young who cannot yet know life…. The wretched new writers of contemporary fiction, like Andreyev, are only able to concentrate upon the dirty spots in the human fall and proclaim to the uneducated, the half-intelligent reading public, and invite them to examine deep into the decayed corpse of fallen humanity and to shut its eyes to the whole of God’s spacious and beautiful world with its beauty of nature, with the greatness of art, with the high aspirations of human souls, with the religious and moral struggle and the great ideals of good….” Novoe Vremya, 1903.
. Three fragments of this have been published: “L. N. Tolstoy’s Marriage” in Russkoye Slovo, 1912; “On the Drama, The Power of Darkness” in Tolstovskii Ezhegodnik, 1912, pages 17-23; and “L. N. Tolstoy’s Visits to the Optina Monastery” in Tolstovskii Ezhegodnik, 1913, Part III, pages 3-7.
. The history of these MSS. has been discussed at great length in newspapers and magazines. The gist of the matter is as follows. By Tolstoy’s will everything written by him up to the date of his death, “wherever it may be found and in whose possession,” was to pass to his daughter Alexandra Lvovna Tolstoy. She laid claim to the MSS. deposited in the Historical Museum. But S. A. T. opposed this, declaring that the MSS. had been given to her as a gift by Tolstoy, were her own property, and therefore could not be included in his will. The authorities of the Historical Museum refused both parties access to the MSS. until the question had been settled by a court. The history of the case is given in Tolstovskii Ezhegodnik for 1913. Part V, pages 3-10, and in the journal Dela i Dni, 1921, pages 271-293, in which A. S. Nikolaev gave an account of the case, re Count L. N. Tolstoy’s MSS.
. The letter of 8 July, 1897. On the envelope Tolstoy wrote: “Unless I direct otherwise, this letter shall after my death be handed over to Sophie Andreevna.” The letter was entrusted to N. L. Obolenskii, Tolstoy’s son-in-law. See L. N. Tolstoy’s Letters to his Wife, pages 524-526.
. Tolstoy announced this in a letter to the editor of Russkaya Vedomostii which was published in the paper on 19 September, 1891. The letter is reprinted in the supplement to L. N. Tolstoy’s Diary, 1895-1899, second edition, pages 241-242.
. The death of Vanichka was a terrible blow to Tolstoy who “loved him, as the youngest child, with all the force of an elderly parent’s attachment.” With him the last tie binding Tolstoy to his family was broken. Ilya Tolstoy was inclined to think that there was “a certain inner connection” between the child’s death and Tolstoy’s attempt to leave Yasnaya Polyana in 1897. See Ilya Tolstoy, My Reminiscences, pages 214-219.
. Sergei Ivanovich Taneev, 1856-1915, who for three years consecutively, 1894-6, came to stay in the summer with the Tolstoy’s at Yasnaya Polyana.
. The story of Tolstoy’s illness and his life at Gaspra is told in the fine reminiscences of Dr. S. Y. Elpatevskii, the well-known writer and doctor who treated Tolstoy, entitled “Leo N. Tolstoy, Reminiscences and Character,” Rosskoe Bogatstov, Number XI, 1912, pages 199-232; also S. Elpatevskii, Literary Reminiscences, Moscow, 1916, pages 26-49.
. There was a stern struggle between Sophie Andreevna Tolstoy and Chertkov over Tolstoy’s diaries almost from the first moment of his acquaintance with Tolstoy. Originally the diaries were in Chertkov’s hands. But in October, 1895, S. A. T. insisted upon their return to Tolstoy. On 5 November, 1895, Tolstoy wrote in his diary: “I have gone through a great deal of unpleasantness with regard to fulfilling my promise to Sophie Andreevna; I have read through my diaries for seven years.” After he had read them, the diaries were handed over to S. A. T. who sent them for safe-keeping to the Rumyantsev Museum and later to the Historical Museum.
The later diaries, ending with 19 May, 1900, were also handed over to S. A. T. The diaries of the last ten years, of which S. A. T. is speaking here, turned out to be in Chertkov’s possession. It cost S. A. T. not only much effort, but tears and even her health, in order to get them back. Personally and in writing, and also through V. F. Bulgakov, she entreated and implored Chertkov to return them, but everything proved of no avail. An atmosphere, painful for the whole family, was thus created, and Tolstoy was literally stifled, finding himself between the stubbornness of a morbid woman and the fear of offending a no less stubborn man, Chertkov. It ended by Tolstoy, in the middle of July, 1910, taking the diaries from Chertkov and placing them for safe-keeping in the Tula bank, in order not to hurt either party. After Tolstoy’s death, according to his will, the diaries passed to Alexandra L. Tolstoy. See L. N. Tolstoy’s Diary, Vol. I, 1895-1899, pages 11, 12, and 6; L. N. Tolstoy’s Letters to His Wife, page 493; V. F. Bulgakov, Leo Tolstoy During the Last Years of his Life, Moscow, 1918, pages 255, 261-263, and 265.
. This will in the form of a letter was an extract from Tolstoy’s diary of 27, March, 1895…. His request that his works should become public property was later made in his diary for 1907, also on 4 and 8 March, 1909.
. Three copies of this extract from the diary were kept by Marie Nikolaevna Obolenskii, V. G. Chertkov, and Serge Tolstoy. Evidently S, A. T. did not know this. See Tolstovskii Ezhegodnik, page
