The chronology is based primarily on Leo Tolstoy’s Diaries and letters, and Sofia Tolstaya’s My Life [Moja zhizn’] (as the most recently published source of pertinent information) and her Diaries [Dnevniki], as well as her letters. As with any other chronology, the aim here is to give the reader a broad idea of the overall course of the couple’s years and, as much as possible, from their viewpoint and in their own words. The writings of Nikolaj Gusev (1882–1967), personal secretary to Tolstoy (1907–1909), furnished another most useful source. In the selection process an attempt was made to re-create the times, the milieu and the activities of the Tolstoys, including visits to and from other people. All dates are Old Style (O. S.) unless otherwise indicated (see “From the Editor”).
28 August — Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy [LNT] is born on the family estate of Yasnaya Polyana, near Tula (central Russia, about 200 km south from Moscow) into the family of a retired cavalry colonel Count Nikolaj Il’ich Tolstoy (1794–1837) and Countess Marija Nikolaevna Tolstaja (née Princess Volkonskaja; 1790–1830). Yasnaya Polyana was the Volkonsky family estate. LNT is the fourth child and has three elder brothers: Nikolaj (1823–1860), Sergej (1826–1904), Dmitrij (1827–1856).
2 March — The Tolstoys’ fifth child, daughter Marija (1830–1912) is born.
4 August — Death of Marija Nikolaevna, LNT’s mother.
LNT is under tutoring of his elder brothers’ tutor Fëdor Ivanovich Ressel (?–1845).
10 January — LNT’s family moves to Moscow.
21 June — Death of LNT’s father.
Late June — The Tolstoy children come under the guardianship of their aunt, N. I. Tolstoy’s sister Countess Aleksandra Il’inichna von der Osten-Saken (née Tolstaja; 1795–1841). They are under direct care of Tat’jana Aleksandrovna Ergol’skaja (1792–1874), a distant relative living in the Tolstoy family from her childhood.
Late June — The Tolstoy boys are given a new tutor: Prospère Saint-Thomas (1812–1881).
25 May — Death of LNT’s grandmother Countess Pelageja Nikolaevna Tolstaja (née Princess Gorchakova; 1762–1838).
6 July — The Tolstoy children are separated. The two eldest boys (Nikolaj and Sergej) stay in Moscow under the instruction of Prospère Saint-Thomas while Dmitrij, Lev and Marija move to Yasnaya Polyana together with T. A. Ergol’skaja. Except for brief visits to Moscow, LNT will spend most of the time between summer 1838 and autumn 1841 on the estate.
22 August — Death of LNT’s aunt Aleksandra Osten-Saken.
October — Pelageja Il’inichna Jushkova (née Tolstaja; 1797–1876) — another sister of LNT’s father’s — and Aleksandr Sergeevich Voejkov (1801–?) — a nearby landowner — are appointed new guardians of the children.
November — all the Tolstoy children move to Kazan’, where P. I. Jushkova lives. Nikolaj Tolstoy is transferred from Moscow University to Kazan’ University.
May–June — LNT fails entrance exams at Kazan’ University.
22 August — Sofia Andreevna Tolstaya [SAT] is born Sofia Andreevna Behrs in the village of Pokrovskoe Glebovo-Streshnevo (near Moscow) into the family of a court physician (a doctor of the Moscow Court Administration and Supernumerary Physician to Moscow Theatres), Andrej Evstaf’evich Behrs (1808–1868) and Ljubov’ Aleksandrovna Islavina (1826–1886). She has one elder sister, Elizaveta (1843–1919).
September — LNT is admitted to Kazan’ University (Faculty of Oriental Languages) after petitioning the Rector.
Summer — LNT spends summer holidays at Yasnaya Polyana. He studies philosophy.
September — LNT transfers to the Faculty of Law.
LNT spends the summer at Yasnaya Polyana.
29 October — Tat’jana Andreevna Behrs (SAT’s younger sister, 1846–1925) is born.
17 March — LNT begins his first Diary (makes entries until 16 June).
April — LNT receives his part of the family inheritance (the Yasnaya Polyana estate and a few nearby villages) and immediately leaves the university on grounds of “ill health and domestic circumstances”.
1 May — LNT returns to Yasnaya Polyana. He devotes himself to his estate and the welfare of his serfs.
Early February — LNT moves to St. Petersburg. He intends to enter public service, but experiences heavy debts and disillusionment.
Autumn — LNT opens a school for peasant children on his estate.
LNT devotes much time to piano practice; he resumes writing his Diary.
30 December — LNT is assigned the lowest civil service rank of kollezhskij registrator (14th class according to the Russian Table of ranks, equivalent to praporshchik (ensign), the lowest officer rank in the army).
LNT’s first serious attempts at writing, along with heavy gambling (at cards).
29 April — LNT leaves for the Caucasus with his brother Nikolaj, travelling through Kazan’ and the lower Volga.
June — LNT takes part as a Cossack volunteer in a raid against a Caucasus village.
LNT continues working on the early drafts of his story Childhood [Detstvo]. He retires from the civil service and requests admittance to military service.
January — LNT joins the Russian army as a cadet, serving in the Caucasus. At one point he is nearly killed by a grenade.
LNT spends most of the year at the Cossack outpost Starogladkovskaja, involved in military duties, reading, writing and gambling.
4 July — LNT sends Childhood to editor Nikolaj Nekrasov at the journal Sovremennik.
September — Childhood appears in Sovremennik Nº 9 (1852), and is well received by both literary circles and the general public.
February–March — LNT takes part in a campaign against Chechens. Questioning justifications of war, he contemplates withdrawing from military service.
March — LNT’s story The raid [Nabeg] appears in Sovremennik Nº 3 (1853).
October — Turkey and Russia declare war on each other.
9 January — LNT receives a military commission with the rank of praporshchik. He is transferred to Bessarabia (now Moldova).
6 September — LNT is promoted to the next military rank of podporuchik (sublieutenant), and is subsequently transferred to the Crimea.
October — LNT’s story Boyhood [Otrochestvo] appears in Sovremennik Nº 10 (1854).
7 November — LNT arrives at Sevastopol’, where he takes up military service in various positions in and around the city.
LNT serves on the Crimea front.
January — LNT’s short story Notes of a billiard marker [Zapiski markëra] appears in Sovremennik Nº 1 (1855).
25 January — Sofia Andreevna’s paternal grandmother, Elisaveta Ivanovna Behrs (née Vul’fert; 1789–1855), dies of cholera at age 66.
18 February — Emperor Nicholas I (1796–1855) dies in St. Petersburg after a thirty-year reign.
June — LNT’s story Sevastopol’ in December [Sevastopol’ v dekabre] appears in Sovremennik Nº 6 (1855).
4 August — LNT is present during the Battle of the Chernaya (Srazhenie u Chërnoj Rechki), although his detachment does not take active part in the hostilities.
28 August (9 September) — Sevastopol’ is taken by the Coalition forces. LNT witnesses the last battle.
September — Sevastopol’ in May [Sevastopol’ v mae] (although heavily censored) and the short story The wood-cutting [Rubka lesa] appear in Sovremennik Nº 9 (1855).
19 November — LNT returns to St. Petersburg, where he frequents local literary circles, meeting Ivan Turgenev, Nikolaj Nekrasov, Ivan Goncharov, Aleksandr Ostrovsky and other writers.
Late November — LNT meets his great aunt Countess Aleksandra Andreevna Tolstaja (1817–1904), daughter of LNT’s paternal uncle Andrej Andreevich Tolstoj (1771–1844), appointed lady-in-waiting at the Imperial Court in 1846; they develop a friendship which will last for many years.
January — LNT’s story Sevastopol’ in August 1855 [Sevastopol’ v avguste 1855 goda] appears in Sovremennik Nº 1 (1856).
March — LNT’s story The snowstorm [Metel’] appears in Sovremennik Nº 3 (1856).
26 March — LNT is promoted to the next higher military rank of poruchik (lieutenant).
May — LNT’s story Two hussars [Dva gusara] appears in Sovremennik Nº 5 (1856). LNT begins his acquaintance with a prominent Russian poet Afanasij Afanas’evich Fet (real surname: Shenshin, 1820–1892) that will later grow into a lifelong friendship.
26 May — LNT and SAT’s uncle Konstantin Aleksandrovich Islavin (1827–1903) visit SAT’s mother Ljubov’ Aleksandrovna Behrs in Pokrovskoe-Streshnevo. From LNT’s Diary: “The children waited on us. Such kind, cheerful girls!” (PSS 47: p. 76).
27 May — LNT leaves Moscow for Yasnaya Polyana.
Summer/Autumn — LNT lives at Yasnaya Polyana often going visiting (including Ivan Turgenev at Spasskoe-Lutovinovo in May and July) and hunting. He devotes himself to intense reading and equally intense writing (working on Youth [Junost’] and The Cossacks [Kazaki], also beginning work on the novel The Decembrists [Dekabristy], two comedies and other writings). He becomes infatuated with Valerija Vladimirovna Arsen’eva (1836–1909), over whom he had been appointed guardian, and contemplates marriage. His friendship with Turgenev cools, along with (gradually) his feelings for Arsen’eva. He is unsuccessful in his attempt to free his serfs.
26 August — Alexander II (1818–1881) is crowned Emperor of Russia; he reigns until his assassination in 1881.
Late September — A separate edition of LNT’s War stories [Voennye rasskazy] is published.
Autumn — LNT sends an official request for withdrawal from military service, which is refused three weeks later. A second request is granted by the end of the year.
Early October — A separate edition of LNT’s Childhood [Detstvo] and Boyhood [Otrochestvo] is published.
12 December — LNT breaks off relations with Arsen’eva.
January — Youth [Junost’] appears in Sovremennik Nº 1 (1857).
Late January–July — LNT’s first trip abroad to France, Switzerland and Germany. He visits Paris, Dijon, Versailles, including theatres and museums, and public lectures at the Sorbonne.
25 March [6 April N.S.] — LNT witnesses a public execution in Paris; under the shock of this, he decides to spend the next few months in Switzerland (also visiting northern Italy and Germany, returning home by the end of July.
1 December —The first short biography of LNT is published in Nº 34 of Russkij khudozhestvennyj listok, together with his lithographed portrait. He continues working intermittently on several stories (including The Cossacks [Kazaki], Albert [Al’bert] and Lucerne [Ljutsern]).
January–February — Tolstoy takes an interest in two women: Ekaterina Fedorovna Tjutcheva (1835–1882; daughter of the famous Russian poet Fedor Ivanovich Tjutchev) and, briefly, in Princess Praskov’ja Sergeevna Shcherbatova (1840–1924).
9 April — LNT leaves Moscow for Yasnaya Polyana.
April — LNT’s intensive work on The Cossacks [Kazaki].
May–September — While farming at Yasnaya Polyana, LNT begins a two-year affair with married peasant woman Aksin’ja Bazykina (née Sakharova, 1836–1919; the Bazykin family was also known by the surname Anikanov).
15 September — In Moscow LNT meets E. F. Tjutcheva, of whom he writes the next day in his Diary: “I was almost ready to marry her quietly and without love but she was deliberately cold towards me” (PSS 48: p. 17).
22 December — LNT is nearly killed by a bear while hunting.
1 January — LNT confides to his Diary: “I have to marry this year or never” (PSS 48: p. 20).
January — LNT’s story Three deaths [Tri smerti] appears in Biblioteka dlja chtenija Nº 1.
May — LNT’s story Family happiness [Semejnoe schast’e] appears in Nº 7 & Nº 8 of Russkij vestnik.
Late October — LNT founds a school for peasant children at Yasnaya Polyana.
January–June — LNT continues teaching at his school for peasant children at Yasnaya Polyana.
May — LNT writes about his relationships with Aksin’ja Bazykina: “It even frightens me how dear she is to me” (Diary, 25 May, PSS 48: p. 25) and likens his feelings for her to those “of a husband for his wife” (Diary, 26 May, loc. cit.)
20 June — LNT writes to Fet: “…[this] solitary life, i.e. the absence of a wife, and the thought that it is becoming [too] late … disturbs [me]” (PSS 60: Nº 174).
End of June — LNT visits the Behrs family in Moscow.
July–August — On his second and final trip abroad, LNT studies educational theory and practice in Germany and Switzerland, revisits Paris, meets Turgenev, and in December moves to Italy.
20 September — death of LNT’s brother Nikolaj Tolstoj. On 13 October LNT writes in his Diary: “Nikolen’ka’s death [has been] the strongest impression in my life” (PSS 48: p. 30).
October–November — LNT remains in the Southern France, visits some schools in Marseille, tries to work on the novel The Decembrists [Dekabristy].
Winter — LNT travels through Europe: Italy, France, England (where he meets Aleksandr Gertsen, attends a lecture on education by Charles Dickens and hears Prime Minister Henry Temple (Viscount Palmerston) speaking in the House of Commons), Belgium (where he meets Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, known as the ‘father of anarchism’) and Germany; returns to Russia on 13 April.
19 February (3 March) — Emperor Alexander II proclaims the abolition of serfdom in Russia.
6 May — After a visit to the Behrs family LNT writes in his Diary: “But I dare not marry Liza” [SAT’s elder sister] (PSS 48: p. 37).
April–May — LNT returns to Yasnaya Polyana and resumes teaching at his Yasnaya Polyana school.
May–June — LNT is appointed and confirmed an Arbiter of the Peace (a post from which he resigns the following year).
Late May — LNT quarrels with Turgenev and challenges him to duel.
22–23 September — In Moscow LNT confides to his Diary: “Liza Behrs is tempting me; but it won’t work out. Reason alone isn’t enough — there’s no feeling” (PSS 48: p. 38).
November — Several students arrive to help LNT in his teaching work at the schools he has founded in and around Yasnaya Polyana (twelve by 29 November 1862; see PSS 60: Nº 299).
In 1861 Sofia Behrs passes the Moscow University Home Teachers’ examination.
Early 1860s
Sofia Behrs writes a story entitled “Natasha”.
1862
SAT begins writing her Diaries [Dnevniki], which she continues up until 1910, albeit with significant gaps. There are practically no entries for the following years: 1868, 1880–1881, 1883–1884, 1888–1889, 1893–1894, 1896, 1905–1907, 1909. LNT continues teaching (21 schools by 26 January; PSS 60: Nº 230). He starts an educational magazine entitled Jasnaja Poljana [Yasnaya Polyana](twelve issues appear in 1862–63), with contributions by himself, his teachers and pupils.
Early February — LNT suffers significant losses in a card game. In urgent need of income, he sells his Cossacks (dubbed “the Caucasian novel”) to the editor of Russkij vestnik, M. N. Katkov, who offers him 1,000 roubles in advance.
15 May — LNT released from his post as Arbiter of the Peace.
14–19 May — In Moscow LNT visits, amongst others, the Behrs family.
May — LNT travels to the Samara region for koumiss [mare’s milk] treatment, returning by the end of July.
6–7 July — Police raid Yasnaya Polyana during LNT’s absence, search through his papers and correspondence.
5–6 August — On their way to their grandfather’s (A. M. Islen’ev) country estate of “Ivitsy” (Tula Gubernia), Ljubov’ Behrs and her three daughters (Elizaveta, Sofia and Tat’jana) visit LNT and stop over at Yasnaya Polyana.
Mid-August — L.A. Behrs and her three daughters visit Yasnaya Polyana again on their way back to Moscow. LNT makes a momentous decision and travels to Moscow with them.
26 August — Sofia Behrs shows her story “Natasha” to LNT, who recognises himself in the ugly elderly hero Dublitskij. (The text is not extant, as SAT destroys the manuscript before the wedding.)
14 September — LNT writes a proposal to Sofia Behrs.
16 September — Sofia Behrs agrees to marry LNT.
23 September — LNT marries Sofia Andreevna Behrs. After their wedding at the Nativity of the Most Holy Mother of God Church in Moscow, they travel to Yasnaya Polyana.
Late 1862 — LNT starts work on a novel which will become War and Peace [Vojna i mir]. He decides to end his involvement in his schools as well as to stop publishing his pedagogical journal (Yasnaja Poljana) and to return to literary pursuits.
January — SAT makes the acquaintance of an old friend of LNT’s, the poet Fet, who over his lifetime will dedicate several poems to SAT.
February — The Cossacks [Kazaki] appears in Russkij vestnik Nº 1 (1863).
25 February — SAT writes to her sister Tat’jana that LNT has started work on a new novel (apparently, the future War and Peace).
March — LNT’s story Polikushka appears in Russkij vestnik Nº 2 (1863).
28 June — the Tolstoys’ first child, Sergej L’vovich [Serëzha] Tolstoy (1863–1947), is born.
5 August — LNT’s Diary: “Her [SAT’s] character deteriorates every day… injustice and calm egotism frighten and torment me…” (PSS 48: p. 56).
October–November — LNT briefly renews his teaching of peasant children at Yasnaya Polyana.
1863–1864
SAT’s sister Tat’jana Andreevna [Tanja] carries on a romance with LNT’s elder brother, Sergej Nikolaevich Tolstoy (1826–1904); he, however, is also in love with a gypsy named Marija Mikhajlovna [Masha] Shishkina (1832–1919; see 7 June 1867 below).
1864
22–26 April — During his brother Sergej’s and his sister Marija’s absence, LNT visits their estate Pirogovo in order to curry the necessary inspection and work. This is the subject of a brief correspondence with SAT.
7–13 August — LNT goes on a hunting and visiting trip in the region without SAT.
August–September — A two-volume set of LNT’s Collected works [Sobranie sochinenij] is published.
4 October — The Tolstoys’ second child, Tat’jana L’vovna [Tanja] Tolstaja (1864–1950), is born.
21 November — After having no success with doctors in Tula, LNT goes to Moscow to consult with doctors there regarding a shoulder injury received from a fall from his horse. SAT is greatly concerned and writes almost daily letters to her husband.
25 November — SAT writes in a letter to her husband concerning her ongoing transcribing of War and Peace: “What you have left me to transcribe — how good it all is!..” By the time the novel is finished, she will have transcribed many parts of it several times.
1865
February–March — The novel The Year 1805 [1805-j god] (roughly corresponding to the first book of War and Peace) appears in two issues of Russkij vestnik (Chapters 1–28 in Nº 1 and Chapters 29–38 in Nº 2).
17 February — Fet and his wife visit Yasnaya Polyana.
18 May — LNT, SAT and their children go to Pirogovo, from where LNT makes a brief trip over the next few days.
26 June — The Tolstoys go to Nikol’skoe-Vjazemskoe and then to Pokrovskoe, from where LNT takes several brief trips.
Autumn — LNT works intensively on War and Peace; SAT’s equally intensive copying.
1866
Early January — LNT is in Moscow preparing an apartment for his family’s move there.
March–May — The second part of The Year 1805 (roughly corresponding to Book Two of War and Peace) appears in three issues of Russkij vestnik (Chapters 1–9 in Nº 2, Chapters 10–14 in Nº 3 and Chapters 15–24 in Nº 4).
Mid-April — LNT visits Nikol’skoe (see letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 47)
22 May — The Tolstoys’ third child, Il’ja L’vovich [Iljusha] Tolstoy (1866–1933), is born.
July–August — the house at Yasnaya Polyana is expanded.
August — LNT writes several short plays for domestic performance at Yasnaya Polyana.
29–31 October — Tolstoy and his sister-in-law Tat’jana Andreevna Behrs visit Cheremoshnja and Nikol’skoe (see letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 51 & Nº 52).
10–18 November — In Moscow, LNT meets artist Mikhail Sergeevich Bashilov (1821–1870), who is working on illustrations for War and Peace. He returns, for the first time, by train (on the recently opened Moscow-Kursk Railway, which passes through Tula).
1867
18–24 March — LNT visits Moscow to attend the funeral of Dar’ja Aleksandrovna D’jakova, the wife of his friend Dmitrij Alekseevich D’jakov (see letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº61, 62). During this trip, LNT signs a draft contract about the future publication of his novel, at the same time he crosses out the title The Year 1805 and writes in: War and Peace.
7 June — LNT’s elder brother Sergej Tolstoy marries his gypsy companion of 18 years, Marija Mikhajlovna Shishkina (1832–1919).
16–25 June — LNT travels to Moscow on business concerning the printing of War and Peace (see letters to SAT of 18–22 June & PSS 83: Nº 65–68).
24 July — SAT’s younger sister Tat’jana Andreevna Behrs marries her cousin, Aleksandr Mikhajlovich Kuzminskij (1843–1917).
End of July–early August — LNT travels to Moscow in connection with the printing of War and Peace; he makes subseqent trips there in late September and early November (see letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 69 and Nº 74 & Nº 75).
25–27 September — LNT visits Borodino in connection with battle scenes for the novel (see letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 70–72).
December — The first three volumes of War and Peace are published as a separate edition.
27–30 December — LNT travels to Moscow because of the sickness of his father-in-law, Andrej Evstaf’evich Behrs (see letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 77).
7 January — In Moscow, SAT attends the wedding of her elder sister Elizaveta Andreevna [Liza] to Gavriil Emel’janovich Pavlenkov (1824–1892). The marriage fails, and in 1877 she marries her cousin Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Behrs (1844–1921).
14 February — The Tolstoys arrive in Moscow to be near SAT’s father, Andrej Evstaf’evich Behrs (1808–1868), who is dying.
March — The fourth volume of War and Peace is published.
30 May — Andrej Behrs, SAT’s father, dies. LNT and SAT attend the funeral in early June. (See My Life, II.77–80)
September — In his Notebook, LNT begins sketching out a primer for peasant children (PSS 48: 167).
1869
17–19 January — LNT goes to Moscow (see letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 79).
February — The fifth volume of War and Peace is published.
20 May — The Tolstoys’ fourth child, Lev L’vovich [Lëva] Tolstoj (1869–1945), is born. LNT completes War and Peace.
Night of 2–3 August — The so-called Arzamas incident: while stopping in the small town of Arzamas, LNT suffers a sudden attack of “anguish, fear, terror” (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 82). (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 82)
December — The sixth (final) volume of War and Peace is published.
LNT begins studying Greek. First thoughts about the future novel Anna Karenina. SAT begins teaching her two eldest children to read and write — she will continue seeing personally to the primary education of all her children.
14 February — SAT writes under the heading Moi zapisi raznye dlja spravok [Various notes for future reference]: “…it came to me that I could be of service to my descendants, who might be interested in a biography of Lëvochka [SAT’s endearing name for LNT], and make an account not of his everyday doings, but of his intellectual life, so far as I am able to keep track of it.…” (Dnevniki 1: 495). Nine years later SAT will publish a brief biography of her husband (see entry under 1879 below).
19–20(?) February — LNT visits Fet (see LNT’s letter to Fet, PSS 61: Nº 302).
22 February — LNT conceives his first ideas for his future novel Anna Karenina. According to SAT’s Diary, LNT speaks to her about “a married woman from high society who has lost herself” (i.e., her reputation).
19 March — LNT writes his first letter to his future editorial associate Nikolaj Nikolaevich Strakhov (1828–1896; see Donskov 2003, Letter 1). Over the next 25 years both Tolstoy and Tolstaya will continue an extensive correspondence with Strakhov, a prominent Russian philosopher, librarian, literary critic and long-time editorial associate.
1871
LNT continues his Greek studies. He experiences repeated bouts of illness.
12 February — The Tolstoys’ fifth child, Marija L’vovna [Masha] Tolstaja (1871–1906), is born prematurely. SAT nearly dies of postpartum fever.
9 June — LNT travels to the Samara region for convalescence during the summer in Bashkiria; he is accompanied by SAT’s brother, Stepan Andreevich [Stëpa] Behrs (1855–1910), and a servant, Ivan Vasil’evich Suvorov. Travels through Moscow, Nizhnij-Novgorod, by a steamer down the Volga to Samara. He arrives in Karalyk on 15 June (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 86–88), where he will stay until 28 July (see his letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 89–98). He writes to SAT about his intention to buy land in Samara Gubernia.
Mid-August — Nikolaj Nikolaevich Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana for the first time. For his correspondence with both Tolstoys, see Donskov 2000, 2003.
18 August — See SAT’s Diary under this date: “Something has come between us, some kind of shadow has divided us… Ever since this past winter, when Lëvochka and I — we were both so ill — something has been broken in our lives. I know that the strong faith in happiness and life I used to have has been broken within me” (Dnevniki 1: 101).
Late August — LNT visits Moscow to purchase a 2500-hectare tract of land in Samara’s Buzuluk Uezd for 20,000 roubles.
September–December — LNT works on his Primer [Azbuka] for children.
November–December — A large addition to the house at Yasnaya Polyana is built.
26 December — SAT organises a Christmas costume party for her own and peasant children — a tradition which will continue over the years. (LNT dresses as a she-goat.)
1872
LNT works intermittently on his unfinished novel on Peter the Great and his times.
January–April — LNT re-opens his Yasnaya Polyana school.
4 January — A woman named Anna Stepanovna Pirogova (1837–1872), the mistress of Tolstoys’ neighbouring landowner Aleksandr Nikolaevich Bibikov, throws herself under a train. After reading about this several days later in a newspaper, LNT goes to see the woman’s body. He will subsequently draw upon this incident for the ending of Anna Karenina.
Mid-January — LNT visits Moscow to see about the printing of his Primer.
1 April — SAT writes in her Diary: “The winter’s been a happy one, once again we all got along famously” (Dnevniki 1: 102).
April — In preparation for a new baby due in June, SAT fasts at a local nunnery, accompanied by their eldest son Sergej L’vovich [Serëzha].
14–17 May — LNT visits Nikol’skoe with their son Sergej and brother-in-law Stepan Andreevich Behrs.
Late May — The main house at Yasnaya Polyana undergoes another renovation.
13 June — SAT gives birth to a son (Tolstoys’ sixth child), Pëtr [Petja] (he will die within a year).
July — LNT takes another trip to the Samara steppes, stays at Tananyk (see his letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 100–102). He returns earlier than planned because of problems with the publishing of his Primer.
Early-mid September — LNT contemplates emigration to England following legal proceedings against him for criminal negligence after a fatal injury to herdsman on his estate during his absence.
Autumn — The first two books of the Primer are printed in September; the third appears in October and the fourth in November. SAT has taken an active part in editing these volumes, as well as contributing several of her own stories.
27–30 October — LNT goes to Moscow to find an English governess for his children.
4–8 November — Strakhov pays his second visit to Yasnaya Polyana.
January–March — LNT works on a novel about Peter the Great.
18–19 February — Strakhov pays another visit to Yasnaya Polyana.
18 March — LNT begins writing Anna Karenina.
28 April — Prince Sergej Semënovich Urusov (1827–1897) — a wartime chum of LNT’s — visits Yasnaya Polyana.
Summer — Samara Gubernia is plagued by a famine because of a poor grain harvest. SAT successfully pleads with Grand Duchess Marija Aleksandrovna (1853–1920) for aid in famine relief. LNT writes a “Letter to the editors of [the newspaper] Moskovskie vedomosti” [Pis’mo redaktoram «Moskovskikh vedomostej»] (PSS 62: Nº 29).
September–October — Artist Ivan Nikolaevich Kramskoj (1837–1887) paints two portraits of LNT — one for Tret’jakov’s Gallery in Moscow and a second at SAT’s request.
9 November — Little Pëtr [Petja] (the Tolstoys’ sixth child) dies of croup.
November — Publication of LNT’s Complete Collected Works [Polnoe sobranie sochinenij], including a revised version of War and Peace. This is actually the second edition of Collected Works (the first edition was published in 1864), although it was called “the third” since LNT considered the publication of his works in journals as “the first”.
LNT continues work on Anna Karenina (which SAT transcribes) and compiles a New Primer [Novaja azbuka] and Readers [Knigi dlja chtenija].
22 April — SAT gives birth to a son, Nikolaj [Kolja] (their seventh child), who dies in 1875.
20 June — LNT’s ‘Auntie’ Tat’jana Ergol’skaja dies; after the death of her mother she had been brought up in the home of LNT’s paternal grandfather, Il’ja Andreevich Tolstoj (1757–1820).
Early July — Strakhov pays another visit to Yasnaya Polyana.
July–August — LNT and his son Sergej visit the Samara estate (see LNT’s letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 107–108).
September — LNT’s article On popular education [O narodnom obrazovanii] appears in Otechestvennye zapiski Nº 9.
14 January — LNT in Moscow.
January — Chapters 1–14 (Part I) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 1 (1875).
20 February — The Tolstoys’ seventh child, baby Nikolaj [Kolja], dies of meningitis.
February — Chapters 15–27 (Part I) and 1–10 (Part II) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 2 (1875).
March — Chapters 11–27 (Part II) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 3 (1875).
May — Chapters 28–31 (Part II) and 1–10 (Part III) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 4 (1875).
June — LNT’s New Primer is published.
12 June–mid-August — The Tolstoy family spends the summer at their Samara estate.
August–October — LNT resumes his work on Anna Karenina, but eventually tires of the work and becomes increasingly depressed.
Late September — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana.
Early November — SAT, seriously ill with peritonitis, suffers a miscarriage in the sixth month of her new pregnancy; she gives birth to a daughter, Varvara [Varja], who dies almost immediately.
22 December — LNT’s aunt Pelageja Il’inichna Jushkova (1801–1875) dies — the youngest daughter of his grandfather, Il’ja Andreevich Tolstoj.
1876
February — Chapters 11–28 (Part III) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 1 (1876).
March — Chapters 1–15 (Part IV) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 2 (1876).
March — Chapters 16–21 (Part IV) and 1–6 (Part V) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 3 (1876).
14 April — LNT writes to Count Aleksej Pavlovich Bobrinskij (1826–1894) that to live without faith as he (LNT) has been living so far “is a terrible torment” but that he is not able to fully embrace religious belief.
Spring — SAT remarks on the spring of 1876 as the beginning of LNT’s ‘moral transformation’, first evident in a letter he wrote in mid April 1876 (14? April, PSS 62: Nº 259) to Countess Aleksandra Andreevna Tolstaja. (See My Life, III.1). This theme occupies fully a third of their letters and runs as a unifying thread through their whole correspondence.
Summer — Strakhov pays two visits to Yansaya Polyana.
September — LNT goes to Samara to buy horses (see letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 114–120).
October — SAT begins writing what turns out to be the first biography of LNT; she continues working on it until April 1878.
Late December — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana. Chapters 20–29 (Part V) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 12 (1876).
Mid-January — On a trip to St. Petersburg SAT visits LNT’s great aunt Countess Aleksandra Andreevna Tolstaja, for whom she has a special affection (see My Life, III.15, also LNT’s letters to SAT — e.g., PSS 83: Nº 123).
February — Chapters 1–12 (Part VI) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 1 (1877).
March — Chapters 13–29 (Part VI) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 2 (1877), Chapters 1–15 (Part VII) in Nº 3 (1877).
Early May — Chapters 16–30 (Part VII) of Anna Karenina appear in Russkij vestnik Nº 4 (1877).
May — When the last part of Anna Karenina is published in Russkij vestnik, the editor, Mikhail Nikiforovich Katkov (1818–1887), makes changes to the ending (the Epilogue) without consulting LNT. LNT decides instead to publish his original ending as a separate booklet.
June–July — Strakhov spends more than a month at Yasnaya Polyana, helping LNT polish the ending of Anna Karenina. By this time Strakhov has developed a most amicable relationship with SAT, and is advising her on the editing of LNT’s works.
14 June — In Nº 463 of the newspaper Novoe vremja, SAT offers her explanation of why the Epilogue to Anna Karenina was not published in Russkij vestnik.
Late June — LNT and Strakhov visit Fet and other neighbours (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 126).
25–28 July — LNT and Strakhov visit the monastery Optina Pustyn’ (see letter, PSS 83: Nº 127, also My Life, III.21).
6 December — The Tolstoys’ sixth surviving child, Andrej L’vovich [Andrjusha] Tolstoj (1877–1916), is born.
1878
LNT resumes his work on writing The Decembrists [Dekabristy].
January — Anna Karenina is published in a separate edition, including the epilogue.
22–26 February — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana.
4–12 March — LNT visits Moscow and St. Petersburg (see letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 131–137).
6 April — LNT writes to Turgenev offering reconciliation.
17 April — LNT resumes his Diary after a 13-year break (entries up to 3 June).
Early May — LNT asks Strakhov to find a publisher for a new edition of his Complete Collected Works [Polnoe sobranie sochinenij] (see PSS 62: Nº 429).
12 June — LNT leaves for Samara estate with two of his sons, Il’ja and Lev. SAT joins him there towards the end of June, Strakhov in late July. The Tolstoys return home in early August. Strakhov follows shortly thereafter for a fortnight’s visit.
August–September — Turgenev visits Yasnaya Polyana twice.
Autumn — SAT makes the acquaintance of the Deputy Governor of Tula, Prince Leonid Dmitrievich Urusov (1837–1885), whom she finds herself personally attracted to and who will have a far-reaching influence on her life. She speaks of the exposure to art and culture she gains from her relationship with Urusov as constituting “the second significant period of my spiritual life” (My Life, III.39) — the first being her reading of LNT’s Childhood [Detstvo] and Boyhood [Otrochestvo] in her youth.
11 October — Strakhov asks LNT for a portrait and brief biography in connection with the next edition of his Collected works, to be published in the series Russian Library [Russkaja biblioteka].
October–November — Under LNT’s dictation, SAT compiles facts from his life for the Russian Library biography. He asks Strakhov repeatedly whether the edition could be published without the portrait and biography but later sends him SAT’s compilation (see PSS 62: Nº 465, 472, 475 and Donskov 2003: Nº 206–209).
27 December–3 January — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana. LNT tells him that he is very much immersed in his work on The Decembrists.
First half — LNT first continues to collect historical materials for his projected novel, but then abandons The Decembrists and starts thinking about a novel set in the eighteenth century. SAT publishes her first biography of LNT, which is included in a volume of his works in the Russian Library series, Volume 9, under the title Count Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy [Graf Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoj].
June–August — Strakhov pays two visits to Yasnaya Polyana.
18–24(?) July— LNT visits his mother-in-law Ljubov’ Behrs at her estate Uteshen’e (see his letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 155–156).
Autumn — LNT continues to collect historical materials for his projected eighteenth-century novel. He also starts works on A confession [Ispoved’], which he completes in 1882.
20 December — The Tolstoys’ seventh surviving child, Mikhail L’vovich [Misha] Tolstoj (1879–1944), is born.
1880
LNT continues work on A confession and begins writing A criticism of dogmatic theology [Issledovanie dogmaticheskogo bogoslovija] and A translation and harmony of the four Gospels [Soedinenie i perevod chetyrëkh Evangelij]. SAT strongly disapproves of LNT’s religious views and especially his penchant for proselytising.
1 January — Strakhov celebrates the New Year with the Tolstoys at Yasnaya Polyana.
17 January — In Moscow LNT negotiates a new edition of his Collected works (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 160); the following week in St. Petersburg he has a heated discussion of religion with his great aunt Aleksandra Andreevna Tolstaja.
Early February — LNT sells the rights for the new (by his count the fourth edition of his Collected works (in 11 volumes)) to the Salaev Brothers’ publishing house.
2–3 May — Turgenev comes for a visit to Yasnaya Polyana.
June and July — Strakhov makes two visits to Yasnaya Polyana.
7 October — LNT meets the prominent artist Il’ja Efimovich Repin (1844–1930) for the first time, with whom he will share a life-long friendship.
1881
January — SAT observes that LNT’s obsession with studying the Gospels has made him “oblivious of life” (My Life, III.73).
28 January — Dostoevsky dies. Tolstoy writes to Strakhov about his feelings (PSS 63: Nº 39).
18 February — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana on LNT’s name-day.
1 March — Emperor Alexander II is killed by a terrorist. He is succeeded by his son, Alexander III (1845–1894). The news of the assassination saddens SAT (see My Life, III.76). LNT petitions the new Tsar, asking him to pardon the assassins of his predecessor (they are hanged on 3 April).
12 March — SAT writes to her sister Tat’jana Kuzminskaja about “a certain discord in the family” (State Tolstoy Museum [GMT], Gusev I: 532)
17 April — LNT resumes writing his Diary (PSS 49). On 18 May he makes his first entry regarding discord in the family.
6 June — Turgenev visits Yasnaya Polyana.
10–19 June — LNT makes a walking trip to the Optina Pustyn’ Monastery where, on 15 June, he discusses the Gospels with the Venerable Father Ambrosius (1812–1891; see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 170–173).
1881: summer — SAT devises a ‘letter-box’ game for her household, whereby members of her family and staff deposit brief anonymous writings in a ‘letter-box’, to be read by everyone together, the object being to guess who wrote what (see My Life, III.84).
9–10 July — LNT visits Turgenev at his estate Spasskoe-Lutovinovo.
13 July–17 August — LNT and his eldest son Sergej travel to the Samara estate. LNT visits Molokan sectarians.
2 August — SAT goes to Moscow to fix up an apartment she has rented for her family in the Volkonskij house in Denezhnyj Lane.
Early September — Sergej Tolstoj becomes a student in the Faculty of Natural Sciences at Moscow University.
15 September — The Tolstoy family moves to Moscow, where tension increases over ‘maternal concerns’ between LNT and SAT; LNT threatens to leave.
Mid-September — The Tolstoys enrol their sons Il’ja and Lev in a private classical gymnasium (school) under the headmastership of Lev Ivanovich Polivanov (1838–1899), author of several books on teaching Russian language and literature.
20–27(?) September — Strakhov visits the Tolstoys in Moscow.
5 October — LNT makes a notable entry in his Diary about “the worst month of his life [since the move to Moscow].”
31 October — SAT gives birth to another son, Aleksej [Alësha], who dies of quinsy in 1886.
November — SAT takes ill.
1882
LNT begins The death of Ivan Ilyich [Smert’ Ivana Il’icha] and What then must be done? [Tak chto zhe nam delat’?] — both finished in 1886. He also finishes A confession, which is promptly banned in Russia.
January — SAT becomes accustomed to high-society life in Moscow.
20 January — LNT publishes an article On the Moscow census [O perepisi v Moskve] in Sovremennye izvestija 19 (1882).
23–25 January — LNT takes part in a three-day Moscow census and becomes acquainted first-hand with Moscow slums.
Mid-February — Countess Aleksandra Andreevna Tolstaja visits the Tolstoys in Moscow.
Spring — In Moscow SAT becomes acquainted with another Countess Sofia Andreevna Tolstaja (née Bakhmetova, 1820–1895), widow of Russian novelist, dramatist and poet Count Aleksej Konstantinovich Tolstoj (1817–1875) — see My Life, III.111.
Late June — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana.
14 July — The Tolstoys purchase the Arnautov house with a large garden in Khamovniki Lane, now a Tolstoy museum (see My Life, III.114).
26 August — According to an entry by SAT in her Diary (Dnevniki 1: 131), LNT declares his desire to leave the family. “The quarrel was a very stormy one. Lev Nikolaevich yelled that his most passionate thought was to leave the family. […] After his bout of yelling at me, Lev Nikolaevich left and didn’t come back the whole night long. I sat down without getting undressed and wept” (My Life, III.121).
September–October — In Moscow LNT prepares the newly bought house for the family; on 8 October the family moves to Moscow for the winter (see his letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 213–223).
28 September–10 October — LNT continues rearranging the house (83: Nº 223–229).
October–November — LNT takes up the study of Hebrew, which concerns SAT; she feels that “this harnessing of his mental forces still had a bad influence on Lev Nikolaevich’s health” (My Life, III.125).
8 October — The Tolstoy family moves to Moscow into the newly acquired Arnautov house.
1883
LNT writes What I believe [V chem moja vera?].
27–28 April — The day after the Tolstoys return to their family estate, a huge fire in the village of Yasnaya Polyana destroys 22 houses.
21 May — SAT receives a power-of-attorney from her husband and the right to publish his works written before the end of 1881. She competes with other publishers in publishing his works written after 1881. Over a period of twenty-six years (1886–1911) SAT publishes eight editions of LNT’s Complete Collected Works [Polnoe sobranie sochinenij] as well as many of his writings in separate editions. The large print-runs and the moderately low prices contribute to the rapid circulation of LNT’s works among the public at large (see 25 January 1904 below).
May–June — LNT spends more than a month at his Samara estate (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 233–242).
12–27 July — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana.
3 August — SAT goes to visit her ill mother who lives with her son Vjacheslav at Rjazhsk (Rjazan’ Gubernia).
22 August — Turgenev dies at Bougival, France.
24 August — LNT hears (from his friend Gavriil Andreevich Rusanov) for the first time about Vladimir Grigor’evich Chertkov (1854–1936), who will later become one of LNT’s publishers and closest advisers (see My Life, IV.11).
28–29 September — LNT is summoned to court but refuses jury duty — on the grounds of his “religious convictions” (My Life, III.142; see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 244).
Mid-October — LNT meets Vladimir Chertkov for the first time.
5 December — LNT’s first letter to Vladimir Chertkov (PSS 85: Nº 1).
December — SAT writes: “In December I came down with a serious case of neuralgia, brought on by my exhaustion and my pregnancy” (My Life, III.147).
1884
A set of LNT’s Complete Collected Works is published by SAT. LNT studies oriental religions, and takes up cobbling. He makes his first attempts to leave home, under the strain of family relations.
January — Russian artist Nikolaj Nikolaevich Ge [Gay] Sr (1831–1894; the grandson of immigrants from France) paints a portrait of LNT.
14 February — What I believe is banned in Russia.
17 February — LNT writes to Chertkov that he would like to publish books “for the people” (PSS 85: Nº 4). Over the years SAT will become increasingly concerned over what she sees as Chertkov’s negative influence on LNT’s life and decisions.
May — LNT continues his work on the story The death of Ivan Ilyich [Smert’ Ivana Il’icha] for a time. The Tolstoys move to Yasnaya Polyana for the summer.
May–June — LNT makes frequent references in his Diary about the discord and misunderstanding between him and SAT.
17 June — After leaving home following a difficult conversation with SAT, LNT remembers that his wife is going to give birth to their child and returns.
18 June — The Tolstoys’ eighth (and youngest) surviving child, Aleksandra L’vovna [Sasha] Tolstaja (1884–1979), is born.
18 June — LNT writes in his Diary: “The break with my wife — I don’t know what’s still to come, but it’s complete”.
October — SAT is distressed to learn of a duel between her brother Aleksandr Andreevich Behrs (1845–1918) and retired cavalry captain Sergej Aleksandrovich Pisarev (ca1855–1909), for whom Aleksandr’s wife Matrëna Dmitrievna (Patti) has left him. Aleksandr seriously wounds Pisarev but does not kill him.
7 July — LNT writes about SAT in his Diary: “’Til the day of my death she will be a millstone around my neck and the children’s. That’s probably how it has to be. Must learn how not to drown with the millstone.”
Night of 11–12 July — LNT wants to leave the family again, but changes his mind after talking with SAT.
21–26 November — Chertkov and LNT establish the publishing house Posrednik [The Intermediary] in Moscow to publish LNT’s stories.
Early December — In Moscow Afanasij Fet offers his poem dedicated to SAT, entitled Kogda stopoj slegka ustaloj… [When with a wearied step one passes…] (see My Life, final poem in Poetry Appendix).
1885
Early January — SAT takes charge of distributing LNT’s published works.
19–28 February — SAT travels to St. Petersburg with her daughter Tat’jana to consult with Strakhov and Dostoevsky’s widow, Anna Grigor’evna Dostoevskaja (née Snitkina, 1846–1918). This is the start of a long friendship between the two writers’ wives. While Tolstoy and Dostoevsky were never destined to meet in person, Tolstaya and Dostoevskaja keep in contact through correspondence and occasional visits. (See LNT’s letter, PSS 83: Nº 298, also My Life, IV.31).
February — In St. Petersburg while visiting the Nicholas Institute (Orphanage), SAT is presented to the Empress Marija Fëdorovna by Headmistress Ekaterina Nikolaevna Shostak (née Islen’eva, ?–1904), who is first cousin to SAT’s mother. SAT petitions the Empress for permission to publish LNT’s banned works, but her petition is rejected.
20–23 February — LNT is intrigued by the writings of American economist Henry George (1839–1897), who proposes the nationalisation of private land (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 299–302).
March — SAT proofreads LNT’s Collected Works (see My Life, IV.38) In the meantime LNT accompanies Urusov to the Crimea (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 305–310).
Spring — SAT sends a portrait of herself to Fet, and in return receives his poem I vot portret, i skhozhe i ne skhozhe… [And here’s the portrait: so like you, yet unlike you…], dedicated to SAT (see My Life, Poetry Appendix under IV.37).
13–20(?) June — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana.
13–23 July — LNT takes ill (see PSS 85: Nº 75).
Summer — SAT pays a brief visit to her brother Aleksandr Andreevich [Sasha] Behrs (1845–1918) in Orël, where he has bought a dacha near Pesochnaja Station. (see My Life, IV.43)
Summer — A Jewish tailor named Isaak Borisovich Fejnerman (1863–1925) begins to frequent Yasnaya Polyana; his questionable devotion to LNT’s views irritates SAT.
16–19 August — Vladimir Chertkov and Pavel Birjukov visit Yasnaya Polyana. Pavel Ivanovich [Posha] Birjukov (1860–1931) is a social activist and political commentator, as well as a friend, follower and biographer of LNT, who later studies the Doukhobor movement in both Russia and Canada and is instrumental in establishing the Tolstoy Museum in Moscow. (See LNT’s letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 322–325.)
August — SAT goes with her daughters Tanja and Masha to the village of Djat’kovo in Brjansk Uezd, where Leonid Dmitrievich Urusov (gravely ill) and his wife are staying with his wife’s brother, Nikolaj Sergeevich Mal’tsev. Urusov takes SAT on one last ride together, before dying of illness on 23 September 1885 (see My Life, IV.45).
12 October — The family leaves Yasnaya Polyana for Moscow; LNT stays at Yasnaya Polyana until 1 November (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 327–339).
18 November — SAT goes to St. Petersburg, where she stays with her sister Tat’jana Kuzminskaja (see Gusev I: 619).
20 November — In St. Petersburg SAT pays a visit to the Director of the State Office of Press Affairs, Evgenij Mikhajlovich Feoktistov (1829–1898), to petition the Censorship Board to allow publication of Volume 12 of LNT’s Complete Collected Works. She also sees the Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs, Vjacheslav Konstantinovich Pleve [also spelt: Plehve] (1846–1904). See My Life, IV.56.
26 November — SAT receives from Feoktistov a written refusal to allow publication of Volume XII, especially A confession [Ispoved’] and What I believe [V chëm moja vera?], and advises her to appeal to the church’s censorship board. She goes for an appointment (granted the same day) with the head of the church’s censorship board, Konstantin Petrovich Pobedonostsev (1827–1907), jurist, statesman and Senior Procurator of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church from 1880 to 1905.
27–28 November — In St. Petersburg SAT has an appointment with Chief of Staff General Nikolaj Nikolaevich Obruchev (1830–1904), at which she petitions, on behalf of her husband, for a young conscientious objector named Aleksej Petrovich Zaljubovskij (1863–?), who has refused military service (see My Life, IV.57). Zaljubovskij will be freed in March 1887 (Gusev I: 661).
18(?) December — LNT is distressed and announces to SAT that he wants to leave her but then changes his mind and stays (see PSS 85: Nº 91).
19–28 December — LNT, accompanied by his eldest daughter Tat’jana, visits the Nikol’skoe-Obol’janovo estate of his friends the Olsuf’evs (see his letters to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 350–351 and My Life, IV.64).
End of December — The fifth edition of Collected works published (marked as the 1886 edition).
1886
LNT continues working on stories for the people. Finishes What then must be done? [Tak chto zhe nam delat’?] and The death of Ivan Ilyich [Smert’ Ivana Il’icha]. Writes The power of darkness [Vlast’ t’my] (banned but performed in Paris in 1888) and begins The fruits of enlightenment [Plody prosveshchenija], initially under the title “Themselves outwitted” [Iskhitrilas’] (see My Life, V.13).
18 January — The Tolstoys’ youngest son Aleksej [Alësha] dies of quinsy (born on 31 October, 1881).
February — The writer Vladimir Galaktionovich Korolenko (1853–1921) visits LNT for the first time.
14 February — LNT finishes What then must be done?
4 April — With some concern, SAT sees LNT off on a trek on foot from Moscow to Yasnaya Polyana (about 200 km). He is accompanied by writer Mikhail Aleksandrovich Stakhovich (1861–1923) and Nikolaj Nikolaevich Ge Jr. He will do this twice more with different travelling companions (see his letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 353–356; also My Life, IV.73). See also April 1888 and May 1889 below.
Early June — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana.
Early November — SAT goes to Yalta to visit her dying mother, Ljubov’ Aleksandrovna Behrs (née Isleneva, 1826–1886), who passes away 11 November 1886 (see LNT’s letter to SAT, PSS 83: Nº 367).
21 November — The Tolstoys move from Yasnaya Polyana to Moscow for the winter.
Late November — The sixth edition of LNT’s Collected works is announced.
1887
LNT writes On life [O zhizni].
2, 3(?) January — SAT writes a letter to the Head of Press Affairs Evgenij Feoktistov concerning the banning of LNT’s drama The power of darkness.
Early January — LNT and his eldest daughter Tat’jana visit his friends the Olsuf’evs at their Nikol’skoe-Obol’janovo estate.
14 January — Feoktistov grants SAT permission to publish The power of darkness [Vlast’ t’my] but expresses reservations about its public theatrical performances (see PSS 26: p. 717).
January — The sixth edition of LNT’s Collected works begins to appear.
6 March — SAT writes in her Diary: “I transcribed [LNT’s] On life and death and then read it through carefully. Somewhat apprehensively I looked for something new, came across some concise expressions and beautiful comparisons, but the basic underlying thought, for me, was still essentially the same — i. e., the rejection of one’s personal life for the life of the spirit. One thing was impossible and unjust, as far as I was concerned, namely, any rejection of personal life should take place in the name of love for the whole world. I think that there are undoubted obligations put on us by God, which nobody has a right to reject, and in terms of the life of the spirit they are certainly not a hindrance, but actually a help.” (Dnevniki 1: 115.)
19–29 April — Czech politician and philosopher Tomáš Masaryk (1850–1937) visits LNT in Moscow and later at Yasnaya Polyana.
20(?) April — LNT meets writer Nikolaj Semënovich Leskov (1831–1895), who visits him for the first time. Leskov’s 1886 story “A tale of Fëdor the Christian and his friend Abram the Jew” [Skazanie o Fëdorove-khristianine i o druge ego Abrame-zhidovine] instantly attracted LNT’s interest and attention.
27–29 April — Tomáš Masaryk visits LNT at Yasnaya Polyana.
May–June — The seventh edition of LNT’s Collected works begins to appear.
Early June — A prominent St. Petersburg jurist, Anatolij Fëdorovich Koni (1844–1927), visits Yasnaya Polyana and tells LNT the true story of a woman named Rozalija Oni, a story which inspires his future novel Resurrection [Voskresenie].
June–August — Strakhov pays two brief visits to Yasnaya Polyana.
25 July–4 August — Countess Aleksandra Andreevna Tolstaja is a guest at Yasnaya Polyana (Diary of SAT I: 145).
3 August — LNT finishes his work On life [O zhizni].
9–16 August — Repin visits Yasnaya Polyana, executes two portraits of LNT and sketches him ploughing.
1 September — SAT places some of LNT’s manuscripts for the first time in the Rumjantsev Museum’s Manuscript Division in Moscow (see My Life, IV.119; also May 1894 and January 1904 below). The museum housed art works originally collected by Russian diplomat Nikolaj Petrovich Rumjantsev (1754–1826). Operating from 1862 until 1925, its library served as the basis for the Lenin Library during Soviet times (now the Russian State Library [Rossijskaja gosudarstvennaja biblioteka / RGB], which is still the repository of many documents relating to both LNT and SAT.
23 September — The Tolstoys celebrate their silver wedding anniversary with just family present.
Early October — LNT starts working on his novel The Kreutzer Sonata [Krejtserova sonata].
26–28 October — LNT visits Chertkov at Krekshino, an estate of the Pashkov family.
November — SAT starts translating On life into French (finishes by 6 February 1887).
Autumn — The Tolstoys are distressed to hear of the broad circulation of copies of Repin’s painting of LNT ploughing in the fields (see My Life, IV.122).
End of December — LNT receives a first visit from Prince Dmitrij Aleksandrovich Khilkov (1858–1914); during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78 Lieutenant-Colonel Khilkov befriends the Doukhobors and in 1899 accompanies two of them on an exploratory mission to Canada.
1888
After several attempts over the years, LNT finally renounces meat, alcohol and tobacco. Growing friction develops between SAT and Chertkov. LNT works intensively on the land.
Early January — LNT visits Chertkov at Krekshino.
29 January — The power of darkness is staged for the first time in French translation by Théâtre Libre in Paris.
Early February — SAT finishes her translation of On life into French.
28 February — The Tolstoys’ son Il’ja L’vovich marries Sof’ja Nikolaevna [Sonja] Filosofova (1867–1934). They settle at the family homestead Aleksandrovka in Chern’ Uezd.
Late March — Tomáš Masaryk pays a third visit to LNT in Moscow (Gusev I: 692).
31 March — SAT gives birth to a son, Ivan [Vanechka], their thirteenth and last child, who soon becomes her favourite and the darling of the family. Sadly, he will die a month before his seventh birthday, on 23 February 1895.
17–22 April — Once again LNT sets out to walk from Moscow to Yasnaya Polyana, this time with Nikolaj Nikolaevich Ge Jr and Aleksandr Nikiforovich Dunaev (1850–1920) — a close friend of the Tolstoys’ and director of the Moscow Torgovyj Bank. This is LNT’s second walking trip (see April 1886 and May 1889; Gusev I: 694; LNT’s letter to SAT, PSS 84: Nº 396–398; also My Life, IV.130).
Late May — The village of Yasnaya Polyana experiences another fire; several peasant houses burn down.
October–November — LNT writes several letters to Chertkov about married life (see PSS 86: Nº 201, 203, 205).
1 December — As a favour to Marija Aleksandrovna Shmidt’s brother Vladimir, SAT buys from him a small nearby estate called Ovsjannikovo, which is eventually given to the Tolstoys’ daughter Tat’jana L’vovna [Tanja].
24 December — The Tolstoys’ first grandchild, Anna, daughter of their son Il’ja, is born.
LNT finishes The Kreutzer Sonata. Begins writing both The Devil [D’javol] and Resurrection [Voskresenie].
5 February — Composer Sergej Ivanovich Taneev (1856–1915) plays the piano at the Tolstoys’ on his first of many visits to Yasnaya Polyana. SAT is infatuated with both Taneev and his music and describes her relationship to him in both My Life (III.39, VI.117) and her narrative Song without words. Her infatuation was to cost LNT years of suffering.
19 February — The writer Ivan Ivanovich Gorbunov-Posadov (1864–1940) visits LNT for the first time. Later he becomes one of the principals at the Posrednik publishing house.
Early March — SAT’s translation of On life [O zhizni] into French is published: Comte Léon Tolstoi, ‘‘De la vie’’. Seule traduction revue et corrigée par l’auteur, Paris, C. Marpon et E. Flammarion éditeurs (sans date). LNT reads the published translation in March.
11 April — SAT organises a dinner for Fet’s jubilee, celebrating 50 years of his literary activity; LNT disapproves.
Spring — LNT has been working on an article On art [Ob iskusstve], which he does not finish, but later uses as a basis for his treatise What is art? [Chto takoe iskusstvo?] (1897–98).
2–7 May — LNT makes a third trek from Moscow to Yasnaya Polyana, this time with one of his followers, Evgenij Ivanovich Popov (1864–1938) — see also April 1886 and April 1888.
May — the eighth edition of LNT’s Complete Collected Works [Polnoe sobranie sochinenij] begins to appear.
May–June — Both Strakhov and Countess Aleksandra Andreevna Tolstaja pay visits to Yasnaya Polyana.
11 July–9 August — Prince Sergej Urusov is a guest at Yasnaya Polyana.
Early December — Tat’jana Tolstaja (the Tolstoys’ eldest daughter) asks LNT for permission to stage an amateur performance of The fruits of enlightenment [Plody prosveshchenija] at Yasnaya Polyana. LNT agrees. This takes place 30 December; three of the Tolstoys’ children (Sergej, Tat’jana and Marija) are in the cast.
LNT begins writing Father Sergius [Otets Sergij].
10 January — The power of darkness [Vlast’ t’my] is given an amateur performance in Russia for the first time — at the Pospelovs’ house in St. Petersburg. Two days later it is staged at the Freie Bühne [Free Stage] Theatre in Germany (see Gusev I: 746).
24 January — LNT meets with Chertkov and Leskov at Yasnaya Polyana.
2–4 February — LNT and his daughter Tat’jana visit his brother Sergej at Pirogovo.
25 February–2 March — LNT pays a visit to Optina Pustyn’ monastery.
10 March — Interior Minister Ivan Nikolaevich Durnovo (1834–1903) refuses to allow SAT to publish The Kreutzer Sonata in Volume 13 of LNT’s Collected works.
15 April — The fruits of enlightenment is given two public amateur performances — one in Tula and the other at Tsarskoe selo, where the Emperor, Alexander III, himself attends, and thereafter allows the play to be staged by amateur groups only.
3–12 May — LNT and his daughter Marija [Masha] visit his brother Sergej at Pirogovo.
June–August — Strakhov pays several visits to Yasnaya Polyana.
5 August — A fire breaks out in one of the huts in the village of Yasnaya Polyana. Five houses burn down. Several members of the Tolstoy family render assistance.
8 December — SAT writes in her Diary of the horrors that still haunt her from reading LNT’s diaries as a young bride (see Dnevniki 1: 127), describing LNT’s past sexual exploits.
16 December — SAT’s Diary reveals the complexity of her current life and its negative effect on her well-being: “This chaos of innumerable cares, one right after the other, often drives me mad, and I lose my equilibrium. It’s easy to say, but at any given moment my attention is taken up with: children studying and ailing, my husband’s state of physical and especially mental health, the older children with their activities and debts, children and [esp. military] service, the sale and plans of the Samara estate — they have to be obtained and copied for potential buyers, the new edition [of LNT’s Complete Collected Works] and Volume XIII with the banned Kreutzer Sonata, the request for dividing [Tat’jana L’vovna’s] property with the Ovsjannikovo priest, proofreading Volume XIII, Misha’s nightshirt, sheets and boots for Andrjusha; not to postpone payments on household expenses; insurance, taxes on the estate, passports for the staff, bookkeeping transcribing, etc., etc. — all of which invariably and directly ought to concern me” (Dnevniki 1: 131). On this date she is also working on transcribing LNT’s article The Kingdom of God is within you [Tsarstvo Bozhie vnutri vas].
1891
LNT publicly renounces copyright on all his works published after 1881. He helps organise famine relief in Rjazan’ Province. The Kreutzer Sonata [Krejtserova sonata] is banned, but SAT obtains the Tsar’s personal permission for its inclusion in LNT’s Collected works. After a poor harvest and resulting famine in several gubernias, SAT appeals in the pages of the newspaper Russkie vedomosti for charitable contributions from the public. Later she helps LNT open food kitchens in Tula and Rjazan’ Gubernias.
January — LNT takes the first steps to divest himself of personal property and gives SAT full power-of-attorney over his financial affairs.
12 February — “I don’t know how or why The Kreutzer Sonata has been linked with our marital life, but it is a fact, and everyone, from the Tsar on down to Lev Nikolaevich’s brother and his best friend D’jakov, has expressed their sympathies for me. In any case, what do others have to offer? In my own heart I have sensed that this story was aimed directly at me. Right from the start it wounded me, humiliated me in the eyes of the whole world and destroyed the last remaining love between us. And all this time I was not to blame for the slightest violation of my marriage vows, not even a sideways glance at anyone during all my married life!” (Dnevniki 1: 153). This is grist for her subsequent novel Who is to blame? [Ch’ja vina?].
25 February — The censorship board prohibits the publication of Volume 13 of LNT’s works, including The Kreutzer Sonata (Gusev II: 20). In My Life (V.76) SAT describes her frustration at this turn of events.
13 April — SAT has a personal audience with Tsar Alexander III, where she obtains permission to include The Kreutzer Sonata in her edition of Tolstoy’s Collected works (though not as a separate publication), as well as the Tsar’s assurance that he will personally act as censor for LNT’s future belletristic writings. She then has a separate meeting with Empress Marija Fëdorovna, conducted in French. (See My Life, V.92–94)
Mid-April — The Tolstoy family begin discussing the dividing of the estate between the parents and the children (Gusev II: 28). The process continues into June, when Sergej and Il’ja join the discussion. Eventually LNT approves a plan for dividing his property among his family members. (See My Life, V.108.)
June — Volume 13 of LNT’s Complete Collected Works is published, including The Kreutzer Sonata.
25 June — We note the first mention of the famine in LNT’s Diary (PSS 52: p. 43).
29 June–16 July — At Yasnaya Polyana, the artist Repin executes a bust of LNT, along with several portraits.
4 July — In a letter to Leskov, LNT speaks about the famine and expresses an opinion that social changes are needed more than direct donations — which partly contradicts his own future energetic actions on famine relief (PSS 66: Nº 1).
11–15 July — LNT writes to SAT in Moscow (PSS 84: Nº 453) and suggests that she publish in the newspapers (on her own and on his behalf) a letter about his renouncing copyright on all his latest works. On 15 July SAT agrees.
21 July — Following yet another difficult conversation with LNT, SAT is saved from suicide by her brother-in-law Aleksandr Mikhajlovich Kuzminskij, thanks to the latter’s chance encounter with a swarm of flying ants (see Dnevniki 1: 201). In My Life, this episode is related twice, not only under 1891 (V.115) but also earlier under August 1882 (III.121).
26 July — SAT describes in her Diary (I.204) the difficulties in getting LNT’s Primer [Azbuka] approved by the censorship committee.
29 July–1 August — Strakhov visits Yasnaya Polyana.
6 September — SAT writes to LNT about the famine.
10 September — LNT writes to the newspaper Russkie vedomosti renouncing copyright on his post-1881 works, including The death of Ivan Ilyich [Smert’ Ivana Il’icha]. Two days later, he sends this letter to SAT with a request to pass it along to the editors but she does not do so. A week later LNT himself sends his letter to the paper (PSS 66: Nº 36), which is published on 19 September (Russkie vedomosti: Nº 258; also Novoe vremja: Nº 5588), later republished in many other papers.
19–26 September — LNT travels to various villages to see the conditions of the starving population (see Gusev II: 43–44).
27 September — The fruits of enlightenment is staged at the Aleksandrinskij Theatre in St. Petersburg.
October — LNT writes an article On the famine [O golode].
15–26 October — SAT asks the Directorate of the Imperial Theatres to send the royalties for The fruits of enlightenment to LNT to be used for famine relief. Under the circumstances, they agree (Gusev II: 49–50). LNT continues his efforts on famine relief through the remainder of the year, with the assistance of his family. By the end of the year, his group has organised 70 food kitchens for the famine victims.
3 November — SAT’s letter to the editor regarding the need for assistance to famine victims is published in Russkie vedomosti (Nº 303). Over the following week she receives the first 9,000 roubles of donations (see her Diary, II: 79; also Gusev II: 52. Later she helps LNT distribute food to famine-stricken peasants; her reports on charitable contributions to this cause appear in Nedelja (Nº 47 and 50 see below).
6 November — LNT’s article The terrible question [Strashnyj vopros] is published in Russkie vedomosti (Nº 306).
1892
The first biography of LNT is published (in German) in Berlin: R. Löwenfeld Leo N. Tolstoj. Sein Leben, seine Werke, seine Weltanschauung. The Preface is dated December 1891 (Gusev II: 90).
7 January — LNT attends a production of The fruits of enlightenment at the Maly Theatre in Moscow.
Spring — An article entitled “Countess S. A. Tolstaya’s refutation of rumours of L. N. Tolstoy’s arrest” is published in Nedelja (Nº 13).
January–March — LNT along with SAT and their daughter Marija render assistance in the famine region of Begichevka; by 11 March, 170 food kitchens have been organised, reaching 212 by mid-May (see LNT’s letter to SAT, PSS 84: Nº 520). In February they are visited there by the artist Il’ja Repin.
April — At LNT’s request, SAT’s portrait is painted by the artist Valentin Aleksandrovich Serov (1865–1911), son of two prominent composers Aleksandr Nikolaevich Serov and Valentina Semënovna Serova (née Bergman) — see My Life, VI.18.
30 April — LNT’s report on the use of recently donated funds is published in Russkie vedomosti (Nº 117).
Late June–early July — Strakhov is a guest at Yasnaya Polyana.
7 July — LNT turns all his property over to SAT and the children.
9 July — LNT leaves Yasnaya Polyana for Begichevka.
27–28 July — LNT compiles another report about the use of funds (see his letter to SAT, PSS 84 Nº 532).
13 August — LNT makes notes in his Notebook and Diary about the need to leave the family.
9–13 September — LNT spends several days at Begichevka, compiling a report on the use of donated funds between April and July, which appears in Russkie vedomosti (Nº 301).
21 November — Afanasij Afanas’evich Fet dies, with whom SAT has had a long friendship, and who has dedicated a number of his poems to her. She in turn dedicates her prose poem “Poèt” [The poet] to him. See Poetry Appendix in My Life, with poems translated by John Woodsworth.
1892–1893
SAT writes the story Who’s to blame? [Kto vinovat?] in response to LNT’s Kreutzer Sonata.
1893
LNT finishes The Kingdom of God is within you [Tsarstvo Bozhie vnutri vas]. SAT proofreads and publishes the 9th edition of LNT’s Collected works. In addition to her diaries, she begins writing what she calls Daily diaries [Ezhednevniki] to record the most salient details of her and her husband’s lives.
Early February — During Shrovetide SAT takes her children to a performance of Ring of love [Kol’tso ljubvi] at Moscow’s Bolshoi Theatre. She pays a visit to Grand Duchess Elisaveta Fëdorovna Romanova (1864–1918) — a devout believer known for her charity work, granddaughter to Britain’s Queen Victoria and wife to Grand Prince Sergej Aleksandrovich Romanov. She reads an article by philosopher Nikolaj Jakovlevich Grot (1852–1899) on LNT and Nietzsche.
6–21 February — LNT with daughter Tat’jana and Evgenij Popov check on famine relief at Begichevka.
11 April — The illegitimate daughter of LNT’s sister Marija Nikolaevna, Elena Sergeevna [Lenochka] (1863–1942), marries jurist Ivan Vasil’evich Denisenko (1851–1916) at the Tolstoys’ home in Moscow.
Late April — Volumes of the new Ninth Edition of LNT’s collected works go on sale. SAT writes: “It was a beautiful edition, with portraits and illustrations, on high-quality paper, and meticulously corrected by N. N. Strakhov” (My Life, VI.66).
June — Vladimir Chertkov transfers the business of Posrednik to Pavel Birjukov and Ivan Gorbunov-Posadov.
End of July — Chertkov and Birjukov visit Yasnaya Polyana. Strakhov visits in August.
30 August — Marija Aleksandrovna Shmidt (1844–1911) settles in the village of Ovsjannikovo, 5 km from Yasnaya Polyana. She becomes a Tolstoyan and copies a number of LNT’s manuscripts.
9 September — SAT takes her sons Andrej and Mikhail to a Moscow gymnasium [school]. She reads works by French novelist Paul Margueritte (1860–1918).
19 October — A new report by LNT and Pavel Birjukov about the use of donations to the famine relief in 1893 is published in Russkie vedomosti: Nº 288.
1894
LNT finishes Christianity and patriotism [Khristianstvo i patriotizm]; Reason and religion [Razum i religija]; Religion and morality [O religii i nravstvennosti]. He writes a Preface to a Russian translation of Guy de Maupassant’s works: Predislovie k russkomu izdaniju sbornika G. de Mopassana «Na vode» [Preface to the Russian edition of Guy de Maupassant’s collection «Sur l’eau»], published by Posrednik (1894).
23 January–2 February — LNT, tired of life in Moscow, pays a visit (with his daughter Tat’jana) to his son Il’ja’s Grinëvka estate in the Tula region (see his letter to SAT, PSS 84: Nº 591).
25 March–3 April — LNT (with daughter Marija) travels to Chertkov’s farmstead (khutor) Rzhevsk in the Voronezh region, and later visits Voronezh itself.
12–13 May — SAT takes (for the second time) eight trunks of LNT’s manuscripts to the Rumjantsev Museum for preservation (My Life, VI.90; also September 1887 above and January 1904 below).
18 May–11 August — The Chertkov family rent a house in the village of Demenka, 5 km from Yasnaya Polyana.
10 June–4 August — Strakhov is a guest at Yasnaya Polyana.
Mid-June — LNT dictates to his daughter Masha a five-act play on a peasant theme. SAT is asked to come up with and put on some kind of dramatic ending. The performance goes well: “but I should say, without boasting, that the presentation I thought up had a much greater success with the audience” (My Life, VI.94). SAT takes Vanechka and Misha to see her son Il’ja at Grinëvka, then to see her son Sergej at Nikol’skoe, and from there to her brother’s in Orël, where the Kuzminskij family is spending the summer at their dacha near Pesochnaja Station.
13 August — A printing press ordered by Chertkov is delivered to Yasnaya Polyana. LNT’s letters are systematically copied from now on.
15 August — SAT reads the 1894 story “Winter day” [Zimnij den’] by Nikolaj Semënovich Leskov “after which I began to dislike this writer even more” (My Life, VI.98). She busies herself with proofreading, sewing and housekeeping.
21–27 August — Slovakian doctor Dushan Petrovich Makovitskij (1866–1921) visits Yasnaya Polyana for the first time. He becomes LNT’s personal physician in 1904.
20 October — Tsar Alexander III dies of illness, succeeded by his eldest son, Nicholas II (1868–1918), who reigns until the Bolshevik revolution of 1917.
Late December — During Chertkov’s visit to Moscow, LNT has a photo of himself taken in the company of Birjukov, Gorbunov-Posadov, Popov and Ivan Mikhajlovich Tregubov (1858–1931) — a priest’s son who came into conflict with the Russian Orthodox Church and then worked for Posrednik (later working with Chertkov in England). SAT dislikes the whole company and destroys the negative (see Gusev II: 162).
The power of darkness [Vlast’ t’my] is produced at the Maly Theatre in Moscow. LNT writes an appeal on behalf of the Doukhobors.
1–18 January — LNT and daughter Tat’jana visit the Olsuf’ev family at their Nikol’skoe estate. January — Vanechka is ill. He dictates the story Spasënnyj taks [The rescued dachshund] to his mother, which is first published in the children’s magazine Igrushechka [The Little Toy]: Nº 3 (1895) and later in SAT’s book The skeleton-dolls [Kukolki-skelettsy] (My Life, VI.107).
End of January–early February — SAT transcribes Master and man [Khozjain i rabotnik], which LNT then submits to the journal Severnyj vestnik, co-published by Ljubov’ Jakovlevna Gurevich (1866–1940) and Akim L’vovich Volynskij [real name: Khaim Lejbovich Flekser] (1861–1926).
6 February — SAT demands LNT give her (and Posrednik) Master and man, threatening to commit suicide. When LNT refuses, she attempts to make good on her threat, but is stopped by her children Serëzha and Masha. LNT begs forgiveness and agrees to hand over his story, whereupon she, Posrednik and Severnyj vestnik publish it simultaneously in three editions (My Life, VI.108).
23 February — Vanechka (born 31 March 1888) dies. He is buried on 26 February in the village of Nikol’skoe, north-west of Moscow. (In 1932 his remains are transferred to the Tolstoys’ family plot beside the Nikol’skaja Church in Kochaki, not far from Yasnaya Polyana.)
Late February-March — Sergej Taneev’s music and friendship help mitigate SAT’s sorrow over the loss of her favourite child.
27 March — LNT writes in his Diary thoughts on his final will, leaving it to whoever survives out of SAT, Chertkov and Strakhov to manage his papers after his death. (See 23 July 1901 and 13 May 1904 below.)
3 June–27 August — Taneev rents the annexe for the summer at Yasnaya Polyana.
13 June — LNT confesses to his son Lev his impression that SAT loves him the way he was years ago, but finds his present self “strange, frightening and dangerous” (PSS 68: Nº 103).
18 June — The Chertkovs again settle at Demenka for the summer.
28–29 June — The Caucasus Doukhobors burn their weapons and immediately experience repressions from authorities.
4 July–8 August — Strakhov spends 5 weeks at Yasnaya Polyana.
10 July — SAT (without LNT) attends the wedding of her son Sergej and Marija Konstantinovna Rachinskaja (1865–1900). In line with SAT’s premonition, Marija becomes estranged from Sergej soon after the marriage and passes on within five years (see My Life, VI.119).
29(?) July–1 August — LNT writes a letter to British newpapers about the persecution of the Doukhobors but does not send it (PSS 39: Nº 209–215).
4 August — Pavel Birjukov leaves for Trans-Caucasia in order to find information on the Doukhobors first hand; returns on 8 September.
8–9 August — Writer Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904) visits LNT for the first time.
27 August–11 September — LNT’s sister Marija Nikolaevna Tolstaja (1830–1912) spends two weeks at Yasnaya Polyana.
4 September — LNT writes a letter to a feminist, Nadezhda Vasil’evna Stasova (1822–1895) about the difficult work of women in poor households.
15(?)–19 September — LNT writes an article about the persecutions of the Doukhobors (entitled initially “Carthago delenda est”).
October — SAT takes her children Tanja and Misha to St. Petersburg to attend two premières on 17 and 18 October: Taneev’s opera Oresteia and the first public staging of The power of darkness at the Teatr literaturnogo artisticheskogo kruzhka. (See her letter to LNT, 22 October 1895).
26 October — The power of darkness is staged for the first time in Moscow, at the Skomorokh Theatre, owned by playwright and theatre entrepreneur Mikhail Valentinovich Lentovskij (1843–1906) — also known as the Obshchedostupnyj teatr M. V. Lentovskogo. On 12 December LNT himself attends a performance here. (See: A. Donskov, Mixail Lentovskij and the Russian theatre, esp. pp. 39–48.)
28 October–3 November — At SAT’s request, LNT deletes 45 passages in his 1888–1895 diaries that she finds offensive. These passages were restored where possible in PSS 50–53 (Gusev II: 193; also LNT’s letters to SAT, PSS 84: Nº 640, 642, 643).
21 November — LNT writes a letter to Pëtr Vasil’evich Verigin (1859–1924), the leader of the persecuted Caucasian Doukhobors, who is in exile in the town of Obdorsk.
29 November — The power of darkness is performed in Moscow’s Maly Theatre for the first time.
December — SAT’s story Grandmother’s treasure-trove: a legend [Babushkin klad: predanie] is published in the children’s magazine Detskoe chtenie: Nº 12 (1895). See her letter to her son Lev dated 12/24 December 1895.
1895–1900
SAT writes the narrative Song without words [Pesnja bez slov], considered by many as autobiographical (see Donskov 2011: 95–107).
1896
January — SAT goes to visit her son Andrej in Tver’, who is serving in the armed forces.
16–24 January — SAT writes in My Life (VII.2) about “three deaths” during this brief period: (a) the elderly Agaf’ja Mikhajlovna [Gasha], former chambermaid to LNT’s grandmother (16 January at Yasnaya Polyana); (b) Nikolaj Mikhajlovich Nagornov (1846–1896), who in 1876–81 helped LNT in publishing his Primer [Azbuka] (23 January in Moscow); (c) the Tolstoys’ long-time editorial associate Nikolaj Nikolaevich Strakhov (24 January in St. Petersburg).
15 May — The Tolstoys’ son Lev L’vovich [Lëva], in Sweden for treatment by Dr. Ernest Westerlund (1839–1924), marries Dr. Westerlund’s daughter Dora Fëdorovna Westerlund (1878–1933), who subsequently accompanies him back to Yasnaya Polyana.
18 May — In Moscow SAT witnesses the aftermath of the tragedy at Khodynka Field, where a crowd of people, under pressure from a militia unprepared to handle such a gathering, stampede, and more than 2,600 people die or are wounded (see My Life, VII.14).
19 May–2 August — Taneev summers at Yasnaya Polyana; his friendship with SAT deepens.
6 June–31 August — The Chertkovs spend the summer at their dacha in Demenka.
Late June–early July — LNT pays visits to his son Il’ja and Il’ja’s wife Sof’ja [Sonja] (with whom he feels at home), as well as to his eldest son Sergej and Sergej’s wife Marija [Manja] (with whom he is disappointed). See his letter to son Lev L’vovich, 2 July 1896.
Summer — At Yasnaya Polyana LNT works on Outline of faith [Izlozhenie very] and What is art? [Chto takoe iskusstvo?], which SAT transcribes.
18 July — LNT receives the first inspiration for his novel Hadji Murat.
10–15 August — SAT accompanies LNT to the Shamordino Convent to see his sister Marija Nikolaevna, afterwards visiting an elder named Father Gerasim at Optina Pustyn’ (see My Life, VII.18).
10 October — LNT confides to his Diary: “Things are fine with Sonja; I myself am weak, but I’m struggling with love.”
4 November — SAT writes in My Life (VII.26): “On one of my visits to Yasnaya Polyana that November I asked Lev Nikolaevich to transfer his copyright on all his writings to me, to make it easier to look after all the publishing side and spare him from having to sign documents, money orders, cheques, and such like. He gave me a flat refusal with a tone of dissatisfaction. I got upset and accused him of not being true to his principles, on the grounds that I alone was doing the work while others were reaping the benefits of my labours. I went on for quite a bit on this subject.”
1897
12 January — LNT writes to daughter Marija about his estrangement from the rest of the family (see PSS 70: Nº 6) and to Chertkov on the same matter (PSS 88: Nº 431).
31 January — LNT (with his daughter Tat’jana) visits the home of Count Adam Olsuf’ev at Nikol’skoe-Girushki, where they are joined on 5 February by SAT.
1 February — LNT writes to SAT about her friendship with Taneev (PSS 84: Nº 673).
6 February — SAT goes to St. Petersburg with LNT; they stay at the home of Adam Olsuf’ev’s brother, Count Aleksandr Vasil’evich Olsuf’ev (1843–1907). LNT wants to see Chertkov and Birjukov, who are about to be sent into exile for their ‘tolstoyan propaganda’. SAT writes to Minister of Internal Affairs Ivan Logginovich Goremykin (1839–1917), asking for an appointment to discuss censorship of future editions of LNT’s Collected works (see My Life, VII.34).
13 February — LNT returns to the Olsuf’evs at Nikol’skoe-Gorushki. On the same day, Chertkov emigrates abroad while Birjukov goes into exile in Bausk in Kurland Gubernia (now Latvia), south of Riga. LNT returns to Moscow on 3 March.
1 March — SAT goes to visit her son Andrej [Andrjusha] Behrs (1878–1939) in Tver’ (see My Life, VII.35).
Early March — The first volume of the 10th edition of LNT’s collected works appears.
17 and 21 March — Aylmer Maude (1838–1938) visits LNT in Moscow; he will later become his biographer and English translator.
18 April — SAT goes with her daughter Aleksandra (Sasha) to visit the Troitsa-Sergiev Monastery [Troitse-Sergieva Lavra] about 70 km north-east of Moscow.
16–18 May — LNT makes several notes in his Diary on his sufferings over his marriage, hinting at his plans to leave home; on 20 May he goes to his brother Sergej’s at Pirogovo to ponder his situation.
19 May — LNT writes to SAT about his “shame” for her and for himself, because of Taneev (see PSS 84: Nº 683).
20 May — After five sleepless nights, LNT leaves Yasnaya Polyana and goes to his brother Sergej’s at Pirogovo to think about his situation. He returns on 25 May.
June–November — SAT transcribes LNT’s article What is art?
2 June — Marija L’vovna Tolstaja marries Prince Nikolaj Leonidovich Obolenskij (1872–1933), LNT’s grand-nephew.
6–13 June — Taneev spends a week at Yasnaya Polyana. SAT confides to her Diary: “I feel so little guilt and so much in the way of quiet, peaceful joy from my pure, peaceful relations with this man that I cannot destroy them in my heart, any more than I can stop looking, breathing or thinking” (Dnevniki 1: 241).
8 June — SAT writes in her Diary: “Today I proofread The Kreutzer Sonata, and again that same weighty feeling: how much cynicism [there is] and naked exposure of the wretched human side!” (Dnevniki 1: 244).
19 June — SAT confesses her discomfort at her position of authority over the poor peasants carrying out illegal timber-cutting on their estate (see Dnevniki 1: 252).
21 June — SAT examines her motives regarding her desire to commit suicide and how her religious convictions prevent her from carrying it out; she also expresses her penchant for listening to “the most complex, harmonious music” and for harnessing her soul “to understand what the composer wanted to say through this mysterious, complex, mystical language” (Dnevniki 1: 254).
8 July — LNT writes a farewell letter to SAT (PSS 84: Nº 684), but hides it inside the upholstery of an armchair in his study. Later, while seriously ill in the early 1900s, he gives the letter to his daughter Marija, instructing her to make a note on it: “To be opened fifty years after my death, if anyone is interested in this episode of my biography.” After he recovers, Marija returns the letter to him. In the year following Marija’s death in 1906, LNT entrusts the letter to her widower, Prince Nikolaj Leonidovich [Kolja] Obolenskij (1872–1934), instructing him to give the letter to SAT after his death. When Obolenskij witnessed SAT opening the envelope after her husband’s death, he notes there are two letters in it. SAT reads them and immediately tears one of them up; its contents remain unknown.
15 July — SAT writes in her Diary: “I am passionately thirsting for music, I would like to play a bit myself. But either there is no time, or Lev Nikolaevich is working, or he’s sleeping — and everything bothers him. Without the personal pleasure I now find in music, life is boring. I try to reassure myself that there is joy in the fulfilment of duty. I make myself do the transcribing, along with everything that comprises my duty, only sometimes my will breaks — I have a desire for personal joys, a personal life, my own work, and not work on someone else’s writings, as it has been my whole life, and then I become weak and don’t feel very well.” (Dnevniki 1: 265)
Summer — At Yasnaya Polyana, SAT transcribes LNT’s article on art, now part of What is art? [Chto takoe iskusstvo?] (but feels weighed down by this task). She plays the piano and continues work on her story Song without words, encouraged by brief visits from Taneev. She keeps on offering excruciating descriptions of her relationship with LNT.
1 October — SAT transcribes the last part of What is art? “For the seventh time I had to transcribe the ‘Conclusion’ to his article On art, and then I had to correct the mistakes in Chapter 10, insert excerpts from various books, as well as the decadent verses which Lev Nikolaevich hated so much” (My Life, VII.43).
30 October–6 November — LNT asks SAT to accompany him on a visit to his brother Sergej at Pirogovo. SAT agrees, mainly for “the chance to be with my husband for several days” (My Life, VII.44).
December — SAT faces difficult emotional turmoil and comes close to another suicide attempt (which afterward torments her). She wallows in her torment at the Troitsa-Sergiev Monastery (see My Life, VII.45).
20 December — A letter is received with a threat to kill LNT on 3 April 1898. SAT notes in her Diary: “This letter disturbs me to the point where I cannot forget it for a moment. […] Lev Nikolaevich has shown no signs of alarm, saying that I shouldn’t alert anyone and trust everything to God’s will” (Dnevniki 1: 333). (See also My Life, VII.45, 48 and LNT’s Diary of 21 & 28 December.)
31 December — The Minister of Internal Affairs, Ivan Logginovich Goremykin (1839–1917), gives the Doukhobors permission to emigrate from Russia on the condition that they never return.
LNT decides to aid the Doukhobors, resolving to raise funds for their emigration by accepting royalties from Father Sergius [Otets Sergij] and Resurrection [Voskresenie] to raise funds. He organises aid for the starving peasants of Tula Province. He writes an article Famine or no famine [Golod ili ne golod].
6 February — SAT writes in her Diary: “…I don’t know where he has hid his latest diary, and I’m afraid he might have sent it to Chertkov. I’m afraid to ask him about it, too. Oh my God! My God! We have spent our whole lives together — all my love, all my youth I gave to Lev Nikolaevich. And here — the result of our lives: I’m afraid of him! Even though I have nothing to be ashamed of before him, I’m afraid of him. And when I try to analyse this feeling of fear, I stop the analysing right away. As my life has developed over the years, I have come to understand a lot of things all too well. ¶The consistency and cleverness with which he has blackened my name, elucidating only my weak points with brief, poisonous strokes of the pen, shows how cleverly he has fashioned for himself a martyr’s crown, and the scourge of a Xantippe for me. ¶Lord! You alone be our judge!” (Dnevniki 1: 350). Xantippe (fifth century B.C.E.) was Socrates’ wife; because of her well-known bad temper, he used her as an object-lesson for his philosophy.
March — SAT visits St. Petersburg, where she stopped over at her elder sister’s — Elizaveta Andreevna Behrs (née Behrs, 1843–1919); while there, she called upon the Orientalist Prince Èsper Èsperovich Ukhtomskij (1861–1921) to ask him, on Lev Nikolaevich’s behalf, to publish something about the Doukhobors and their [need for] assistance (see My Life, VII.51).
23 April — LNT and SAT travel to see their son Il’ja at his Grinëvka estate in the Tula region.
Late April–early June — LNT works on famine relief in the Tula and Orël regions (see his letter to SAT, PSS 84: Nº 704–718).
12 July — SAT travels to see her friends the Maslovs at their Selishche estate, where Taneev, who is also visiting, plays Chopin and Händel to SAT’s great delight (see My Life, VII.57).
15–20 July — SAT visits the Kuzminskijs at their dacha near Kiev (see also August 1899).
17 July — LNT considers leaving home and moving to Finland, then a part of the Russian Empire. See his letter to the Finnish writer Arvid Aleksandrovich Ernefel’t (1861–1933) — PSS 71: Nº 196.
Night of 28–29 July — LNT and SAT have a serious conversation about Taneev, which LNT describes in a letter to SAT’s sister Tat’jana Kuzminskaja (PSS 53: 383–388).
August — SAT spends time copying Lev Nikolaevich’s diaries, so that one copy may be preserved in the museum while the other remains at Yasnaya Polyana. She also transcribes Father Sergius, and works on the proofreading of LNT’s Collected works. She is concerned that her husband wants to sell three of his stories — Hadji Murat, Resurrection and Father Sergius — at a slightly higher price in Russia and abroad and donate the money to the Doukhobors’ emigration to Canada.
7 August — The first party of the Caucasus Doukhobors (1,139 people) sets sail from Batoum (now in Georgia, known as Batumi) for Cyprus, later to be relocated to Canada.
28 August — SAT organises Jubilee celebrations at Yasnaya Polyana in honour of LNT’s seventieth birthday. She is overwhelmed by the number of guests (thirty-six at dinner, forty at supper).
3(?)–29 September — LNT’s son Sergej travels to England to discuss the Doukhobors’ emigration with Chertkov and other people involved in the process.
13 September — SAT writes in her Diary, wondering why LNT would now accept royalties (on Resurrection) for the benefit of the Doukhobors — complete strangers — and not to enhance the lives of his own grandchildren (who can’t even afford to eat white bread). The novel will appear in the weekly journal Niva, published by Adol’f Fëdorovich Marks (1838–1904) — an illustrated middle-class journal published in St. Petersburg from 1869 to 1918 (see Dnevniki 1: 411).
25–27 September — LNT visits the city of Orël in order to see its prison and gain first-hand impressions for his novel Resurrection.
23 October — SAT talks with her son Sergej L’vovich about LNT: “Serëzha says I should give away the copyright on his father’s works. I say: ‘Why? To reward the rich publishers? That’s a lie’” (Dnevniki 1: 419).
9(?) November — Sergej Tolstoy, accompanied by theatre director Leopol’d Antonovich Sulerzhitskij (1872–1916), leaves for the Caucasus to assist the Doukhobors in their journey to Canada.
10 December [22 December N.S.] — The S.S. Lake Huron leaves the port of Batoum and sets sail for Canada with 2,140 exiled Doukhobors on board, accompanied by Leopol’d Sulerzhitskij.
22 December [4 January 1899 N.S.] — Sergej L’vovich Tolstoy sets sail from Batoum with a party of some 2,200 Doukhobors bound for Canada aboard the S.S. Lake Superior.
1899
Resurrection is published during the year in serial form.
8 January — The Tolstoys’ son Andrej L’vovich [Andrjusha] marries Ol’ga Konstantinovna Diterikhs (1872–1951), sister to Vladimir Chertkov’s wife, Anna Konstantinovna.
15 [27 N.S.] January— the S.S. Lake Superior with the second party of Doukhobors on board, escorted by Sergej Tolstoy, arrives in Halifax, where it is quarantined for three weeks.
26 January — SAT describes her repulsion at LNT’s description of the Russian Orthodox service in his Resurrection (see Dnevniki 1: 444; also My Life, VII.64).
February — SAT travels to Kiev to comfort her sister Tat’jana Kuzminskaja [Tanja], who has fallen seriously ill (see My Life, VII.66).
February–March — SAT herself falls ill with the flu, and is confined to bed for eight days.
6 [18] April — the Lake Superior picks up over a thousand Doukhobors from Larnaca, Cyprus, where they had made an unsuccessful attempt to settle. It arrives in Québec City on 27 April [9 May], accompanied once again by Leopol’d Sulerzhitskij.
Late April [early May] — The fourth and final party of 2,286 Doukhobors sets sail from Batoum aboard the Lake Huron, arriving in Québec City in late May. They are accompanied by Dr. Vera Mikhajlovna Velichkina (1868–1918) and her future husband, Vladimir Dmitrievich Bonch-Bruevich (1873–1955), who later both serve in the Bolshevik government (Velichkina as Lenin’s personal physician). See Sergej L’vovich’s most interesting and touching letters to his family from Canada in Donskov 1998: 355–370; also Vera Velichkina’s account (from Russkie vedomosti) of this journey to Canada (in English translation) in Woodsworth 1999: 165–92.
27 May — The Tolstoys’ daughter Tat’jana L’vovna undergoes an operation in Vienna for frontal sinusitis (see My Life, VII.68).
26 June — SAT describes her husband’s listlessness in her Diary (III: 120).
Early August — SAT travels to the Maslovs’ Selishche estate, where she sees Taneev, afterwards visiting the Kuzminskijs in Kiev.
14 November — The Tolstoys’ eldest daughter, Tat’jana L’vovna [Tanja], marries Mikhail Sergeevich Sukhotin (1850–1914). According to SAT’s Diary (III: 122), LNT takes her leaving especially hard.
LNT starts writing The Living corpse [Zhivoj trup] (unfinished). The International Tolstoy Society is founded (see Gusev II: 367). SAT keeps revising her novel Song without words throughout the year.
January — SAT begins her service as a trustee for a children’s shelter, which lasts until February 1902 (see My Life, VIII.2).
January — SAT writes in My Life (VIII.4): “At that time I was unable to practise my music, since the whole house was full of guests, and instead of music I worked assiduously on my novel and finished it. But it still had to be revised. I got ready to study Italian, all on my own, and had already bought a self-instructional textbook. I was never able to survive just on practical chores and material cares, and always sought out some kind of artistic activity or philosophical reading.”
13 January — The writer Maksim Gorky [birth name: Aleksej Maksimovich Peshkov] (1868–1936) visits LNT in Moscow (for the first time).
8 October — Gorky visits LNT at Yasnaya Polyana and SAT photographs them (see, for example, in Gusev II: 352, also Illustration II-45 in My Life).
Late October — LNT, accompanied by his daughter Tat’jana Sukhotina and her artist friend Julija Ivanovna Igumnova (1871–1940), visits the Sukhotins’ Kochety estate.
24 December —The Tolstoys’ grandson Lev L’vovich [Lëvushka] dies. Three days later the Tolstoys’ learn that their daughter Tat’jana L’vovna [Tanja] has had a stillbirth. SAT hastens to visit both of her grieving children (see My Life, VIII.13).
Beginning in early summer, LNT experiences several bouts of deteriorating health, including malaria, which leads to the Tolstoys’ decision to spend the autumn and winter at Gaspra in the Crimea at the personal invitation of their friend, Countess Sof’ja Vladimirovna Panina (1871–1957). Literary visitors include Chekhov, Gorky and Bal’mont. See My Life, VIII.18.
19 January — SAT poignantly describes her frame of mind at the start of the new century in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 10): “I have been busy collecting and transcribing as many of my letters as possible to Lev Nikolaevich over my whole lifetime. What a touching account these letters hold of my love for Lëvochka and my life as a mother! One of them reveals my sorrow over my spiritual and intellectual life (so typical of me), for which I was afraid to wake up, so as not to let go of my duties as a wife, mother and household manager. The letter was written under the impressions of music (a melody of Schubert’s) which Lev Nikolaevich’s sister Mashen’ka was learning to play at the time, as well as the sunset and religious meditations.”
28 January — SAT receives news of a stillbirth from her daughter Marija L’vovna.
31 January — The Tolstoys’ son Mikhail L’vovich [Misha] marries Aleksandra Vladimirovna [Lina] Glebova (1880–1967).
2 February — In a letter to German newspapers, LNT announces that he is turning over “all the negotiations with [foreign] publishers and translators” to Chertkov (PSS 73: Nº 27).
24 Febuary — Tserkovnye vedomosti publishes the Holy Synod’s excommunicaton of LNT from the Russian Orthodox Church.
26 February — SAT writes a letter to the Senior Procurator of the Holy Synod, Konstantin Pobedonostsev and the Metropolitans who signed the decree excommunicating LNT from the Russian Orthodox Church. This letter, together with Metropolitan Antonius’ response (SAT called it “soulless”), were published in Tserkovnye vedomosti: Nº 7 (1901) — see My Life, VIII.16.
23 July — LNT signs his will as copied by his daughter Marija from his 1895 Diary (see 27 March 1895 above). Later (on 28 August) SAT learns from their son Il’ja that their daughter Marija let this happen and becomes very upset. She has a difficult conversation with LNT (see Gusev II: 388).
5–8 September — The Tolstoys travel to Gaspra by way of Sevastopol’.
5 November — SAT takes a photograph of LNT with Anton Chekhov (reproduced in My Life as Illustration II-46). They also have visits from Maksim Gorky and Russian symbolist poet Konstantin Dmitrievich Bal’mont (1867–1942).
12 November — The Tolstoys’ daughter Tat’jana L’vovna [Tanja] experiences a second stillbirth (see My Life, VIII.19).
2 December — In her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 28), SAT vents her frustration at her husband’s current overall mood: “Lev Nikolaevich turned out just the way I had expected: on account of his advancing years he stopped behaving (quite recently) toward his wife as a lover, and this was replaced not what I had vainly dreamt of all my life — a quiet, tender friendship — but by utter emptiness.”
7–13 December — LNT pays a visit to his daughter, Marija Obolenskaja, in nearby Yalta.
1902
LNT finishes What is religion? [Chto takoe religija?]; continues working on Hadji Murat and The light shines in darkness [I svet vo t’me svetit].
January–June — The Tolstoys continue their stay at Gaspra. SAT devotes her time to caring for her husband in his serious illness. Their daughter Marija L’vovna [Masha] experiences a seventh stillbirth.
16 January — LNT writes to the Tsar on the evil of autocracy and coercion and appeals to him to abolish private ownership of land.
Winter–spring — LNT experiences serious illness, almost at the point of death from pneumonia; after his health (slowly) improves, SAT visits Moscow and Yasnaya Polyana. But she returns to Gaspra in May, when LNT suffers a bout of typhoid; once again he recovers.
End of March — Dr. Dmitrij Vasil’evich Nikitin (1874–1960) arrives at Gaspra to be the Tolstoy family’s personal physician (he subsequently treats Maksim Gorky and his family).
Late June — The Tolstoys return to Yasnaya Polyana, and decide to stay there for the winter. Dr. Nikitin accompanies them and later assists in copying LNT’s manuscripts; he also takes photos of the Tolstoy family.
13 July — The owner of the publishing house Prosveshchenie, Natan Sergeevich Tsejtlin (1872–1930s), comes to Yasnaya Polyana and asks SAT for the rights to publish LNT’s works in exchange for 1,000,000 roubles, but SAT declines (Gusev II: 420).
4–8 August — SAT visits the Maslovs at Selishche where she meets Taneev, who is visiting.
31 August — Following LNT’s request, a consilium of doctors recommend he spend the forthcoming winter at Yasnaya Polyana.
2 September — SAT confides to her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 75): “Personally speaking, I find living in Moscow easier — there are a lot of people around whom I like, and there is a lot of music as well as amusements (both meaningful and just for fun) — exhibitions, concerts, lectures, contact with interesting people, social life. With my poor eyesight I find long evenings difficult, but life in the country is simply boring. Nevertheless, I recognise that for Lev Nikolaevich living in Moscow is unbearable with all the visitors and the noise, and so I am happy and content to live at my beloved Yasnaya, and will take trips to Moscow whenever life here wears me down.”
10 October — SAT’s Diary (Dnevniki 2: 204) records her declaration to LNT that after his passing she will not refuse royalties from his works.
25 November — SAT fervently expresses her extreme displeasure over LNT’s legend The destruction of hell and its restoration [Razrushenie ada i vosstanovlenie ego] (Dnevniki 2: 80).
1903
LNT protests against Jewish pogroms in Kishinëv (in Moldova). He writes three stories — Esarhaddon, King of Assyria [Assirijskij tsar’ Asarkhaddon], Three questions [Tri voprosa] and Toil, death and disease [Trud, smert’ i bolezn’]) for an anthology published in Warsaw in aid of pogrom victims — as well as After the ball [Posle bala], which was not published until after his death. Also, he works on Shakespeare and drama [O Shekspire i drame].
2 January — The Tolstoys receive news from their daughter Tat’jana L’vovna of two stillborn twin boys.
January — In response to a request by Pavel Birjukov, LNT begins his Reminiscences [Vospominanija], on which he will continue working until 1906.
3 June — LNT asks his son Mikhail to copy his diaries from the 1840s and 1850s for his biography that Birjukov is compiling.
Early September — LNT works on Shakespeare and drama, finished in 1904 and printed abroad in 1906.
20 September — Dr. Nikitin leaves Yasnaya Polyana; his place is taken by Dr. Grigorij Moiseevich Berkengejm (1872–1919), brother to prominent Russian organic chemist Dr. Abram Moiseevich Berkengejm (1867–1938; see Gusev II: 465).
5–8 November — LNT and Dr. Berkengejm visit the Tolstoys’ son Sergej at Pirogovo.
17 November — SAT confesses to her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 98): “Happy are those wives who live on friendly and participatory terms with their husbands right to the end! And unhappy and lonely are the wives of egotists, great people, whose wives their descendants later turn into modern Xantippes!”
22 December — LNT writes to Countess Aleksandra Andreevna Tolstaja, who is seriously ill (and will die on 24 March 1904) — see PSS 74: Nº 348.
1904
LNT decides to publish no more fiction works to avoid further quarrels with SAT over copyright. He finishes Hadji Murat, but this work is published posthumously.
12 January — Nine boxes of materials originally presented to the Rumjantsev Museum, together with autographs, are transported to the Historical Museum, where they are kept until the end of LNT’s life (see 18 December 1914 below; cf. also September 1887 and May 1894).
25 January — SAT engages a notary at Tula, Jakov Fëdorovich Beloborodov (1826–1912), to legalise the power of attorney she had obtained from LNT in 1883 (see 21 May 1883 above) in the form of a private letter.
February–May — In response to the recently started Russian-Japanese War (1904–05), LNT writes an anti-war article Bethink yourselves! [Odumajtes’!], which is published in Russian and several foreign papers in June.
13 February — Dr. Dmitrij Nikitin returns to Yasnaya Polyana to take the place of the departing Dr. Berkengejm as the Tolstoy family physician.
24 February — SAT begins work on her autobiographical memoir My Life [Moja zhizn’]. Her brief preface penned on this date reads as follows: “Last year Vladimir Vasil’evich Stasov asked me to write my autobiography for a women’s calendar. I thought that too immodest of me, and I declined. But the longer I live, the more I see the accumulation of acute misunderstandings and false reports concerning my character, my life, and a great many topics touching upon me. And so, in view of the fact that, though I myself may be insignificant, the significance of my forty-two years of conjugal life with Lev Nikolaevich cannot be excluded from his life, I decided to set forth a description of my life — based, at least for the time being, solely on reminiscences. If time and opportunity permit, I shall endeavour to include several additional details and chronological data drawn from letters, diaries and other sources. ¶I shall try to be true and sincere throughout. Anyone’s life is interesting, and perhaps there will come a time when my life will be of interest to some who wonder what kind of creature was the woman whom God and destiny found fit to place alongside the life of the genius and multifaceted Count Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy.” Vladimir Vladimirovich Stasov (1824–1906) was a Russian art, literary and music critic (as well as archæologist, art historian and social activist), and an Honorary Member of the Petersburg Academy of Sciences.
March — SAT publishes a collection of nine prose poems under the general title Groanings [Stony] in the magazine Zhurnal dlja vsekh (Nº 3) under the pseudonym Ustalaja [Weary woman]. See section “Poems in prose: Groanings” in Andrew Donskov’s essay in the English translation of My Life.
13 May — LNT writes a letter to Chertkov about his will in respect to his papers after his death (see 27 March 1895 above).
5 August — SAT sees her son Andrej off to fight in the Russo-Japanese War.
23 August — LNT’s brother Sergej Nikolaevich dies; his funeral is held at Pirogovo on 27 August.
2 August — Dr. Nikitin once again leaves Yasnaya Polyana.
18 December — Dr. Dushan Petrovich Makovitskij (see August 1894 above) arrives at Yasnaya Polyana and becomes the Tolstoys’ personal physician.
1905
LNT writes several short stories, all published posthumously.
11 January — Andrej L’vovich returns from the war.
25–27(?) February — LNT writes Alyosha the Pot [Alësha Gorshok].
March — After hearing rumours to the effect that she inspired the pro-war views expressed by her son Lev L’vovich (in an article in Novoe vremja), SAT refutes these rumours in an open letter (for publication) to Vladimir Chertkov in England, which is published in The Times.
24 May — Chertkov is given permission to visit Russia and visits LNT at Yasnaya Polyana after eight years of separation. He returns to England in early June.
Summer–Autumn — SAT continues to paint in oils. She copies her letters to LNT, and goes on writing My Life.
2–7 August — LNT visits his daughter Marija Obolenskaja at Pirogovo.
6 November — The Tolstoys’ daughter Tat’jana L’vovna [Tanja] Sukhotina gives birth to a daughter of her own: Tat’jana Mikhajlovna [Tanja/Tanjusha] Sukhotina (1905–1996). After her husband Mikhail’s death in 1914, Tat’jana L’vovna manages the Yasnaya Polyana estate from 1917 to 1923, and then emigrates with her daughter — first to France and later to Italy. In 1930 Tat’jana Mikhajlovna marries an Italian named Leonardo Giuseppe Albertini (1903–1960). She dies in Rome in August 1996.
December — Dr. Dushan Makovitskij takes a month-long trip to visit his home country of Slovakia (see Gusev II: 536, 539).
LNT writes What for? [Za chto?] and The significance of the Russian revolution [O znachenii russkoj revoljutsii]. SAT continues her oil-painting and photography, helps look after her granddaughter Tat’jana, continues with My Life, works with papers at the Historical Museum.
9–11 February — Taneev and fellow-composer Aleksandr Borisovich Gol’denvejzer (1875–1961) visit Yasnaya Polyana and play for the Tolstoys.
23 July–11 August — Chertkov pays another visit to LNT at Yasnaya Polyana.
30 July — The Tolstoys’ eldest son, Sergej, marries for the second time, this time Marija Nikolaevna Zubova (1868–1939).
7–10 August — LNT, Chertkov and Dr. Makovitskij visit LNT’s daughter Marija Obolenskaja at Pirogovo.
22 August — SAT takes ill, experiences severe pain on the left side of her stomach. Her Diary entry of 1 September (Dnevniki 2: 253) indicates she believes death to be “near at hand”. On 2 September she undergoes an operation performed by Dr. Vladimir Fëdorovich Snegirëv (1847–1917), professor of gynæcology at Moscow University. He practised the methods of Dr. Grigorij Antonovich Zakhar’in, who had earlier treated SAT.
19 November — The Tolstoys’ daughter Marija L’vovna [Masha] Obolenskaja takes ill with inflammation of the lungs; she dies on 27 November.
1907
January–February — SAT visits a number of art exhibits (see Dnevniki 2: 259, 261).
20 May — SAT receives news about the murder of her brother, St. Petersburg engineer Vjacheslav Andreevich Behrs (1861–1907), by some workers.
June — The Chertkovs arrive from England and rent a dacha for the summer in the village of Jasenki, a few kilometres from Yasnaya Polyana (see Gusev II: 589). They return to England in September.
21–29 September — Artist Il’ja Repin comes for a visit and paints portraits of LNT and SAT.
26 September — Nikolaj Nikolaevich Gusev (1882–1967) arrives at Yasnaya Polyana to take up a position as LNT’s personal secretary. He is given lodging in the house of the Tolstoys’ daughter Aleksandra L’vovna [Sasha] at Teljatinki (3 km from Yasnaya Polyana). On 22 October he is arrested for “Tolstoyan” activities and held until 20 December, returning to Yasnaya Polyana the following day.
26 October — LNT muses in his Diary: “It’s strange that it is my lot to be silent with the people living around me and to speak only with those who are far away in time and space, who will listen to me.”
17 November — The Tolstoys’ son Andrej (by this time divorced) marries a second wife: Ekaterina Vasil’evna Artsimovich (neé Gorjainova; 1876–1959).
1908
The Diaries of S. A. Tolstaya [Dnevniki 1860–1891] are published by M. & S. Sabashnikov in Moscow, under the editorship of Sergej L’vovich Tolstoy.
5–6 January — Taneev and Gol’denvejzer again play for the Tolstoys.
January–March — Chertkov (visiting from England) pays two visits to LNT.
25 March — LNT writes a letter asking “all kind people” not to bother celebrating his forthcoming 80th birthday on 28 August (see PSS 78: Nº 99). In response, a week later the Moscow organising committee abandons its celebration plans.
6 May — A difficult conversation takes place between LNT and SAT about the disposition of author’s rights following LNT’s death (see LNT’s Diary; also Gusev II: 622).
13 May–2 June — LNT writes I cannot be silent [Ne mogu molchat’] — against capital punishment.
17 June — The Chertkovs return from England to Russia and settle at Kozlova Zaseka (not far from Yasnaya Polyana; Gusev II: 631).
2 July — LNT is uncomfortable with the fact that his Diary is read (and copied) by both his daughter Aleksandra L’vovna and Chertkov. He starts a new Diary that he calls A diary only for myself [Dnevnik dlja odnogo sebja], which he continues until 18 July (see PSS 56: Nº 171–174). On 6 July he writes in this new diary: “I very much want to leave. And I don’t carry through. But I don’t exclude it either. The main point: if I go away, am I doing this for myself? If I stay, I know that I’m not doing this for myself.” And the next day: “It was a difficult time yesterday. I counted my money and figured out how to leave. I can’t look at her without bad feelings. It’s better now.”
8 August — LNT takes seriously ill; three days later he dictates his will to Gusev (see Gusev II: 639). By 15 August he is starting to feel better.
28 August — The Tolstoy family celebrates LNT’s 80th birthday.
16 September — SAT writes in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 114): “I feel burdened by all the bustle of household cares, which overshadow life itself, and I have thoughts about my approaching death. It’s as if everything is in preparation — what seems to be a preparation for life, but there is no life — i. e., there’s no real, peaceful or leisurely life, no time for the activities which I really enjoy. This is where Lev Nikolaevich has been smart and happy his whole life. He has always worked at what he enjoys, and not because it was something he had to do. He would write whenever he wanted to. He would be out ploughing whenever he wanted to. Whenever he got tired of something, he would drop it. Would I ever try living like that? What would become of the children, or Lev Nikolaevich himself?”
18 September — After Gusev is summoned to the Tula Police Department, an uneasy conversation ensues between LNT and SAT, who fears complications with authorities (see Gusev II: 648).
20 September — SAT confides to her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 116–117): “I’ve given myself completely to household tasks. But this has been possible for me only because I’ve done it in conjunction with a constant communication with Nature and an admiration thereof. […] During all this time I read articles about Lev Nikolaevich, about us, in all different languages. Nobody really knows or understands him. I know the actual essence of his nature and mind better than anybody else. But no matter what I write, people will not believe me. Lev Nikolaevich is a man of tremendous intellect and talent, a man of extraordinary imagination, sensitivity and artistic instinct. Yet he is also a man without a real heart or genuine kindness. His kindness is conceptual, not direct. […] I am depressed and lonely in my soul; nobody loves me. Apparently, I am unworthy. There is a good deal of passion within me, an unmitigated compassion for people, — but there’s not much kindness in me, either. My best qualities are a feeling of duty and motherhood.”
18 December — SAT writes a letter to Gorbunov-Posadov about the need to stop publishing LNT’s works written before 1881 in Posrednik (see Gusev II: 656).
1909
22 January — Regarding a priest’s visit to SAT, LNT notes in his Diary: “I find it especially repugnant that he asked Sofia Andreevna to let him know when I am dying. They’ll think up anything to assure people that I ‘repented’ before my death. And so I declare (once again, it seems) that… anything they may say about my deathbed confession and communion is a lie” (italics — LNT).
30 January — In a letter, LNT gives Chertkov “full authority” [polnoe pravo] to publish any of his personal letters to anybody (see PSS 89: Nº 816).
6 March — Chertkov is issued a police order to leave Tula Gubernia in three days. SAT protests in a letter published in Russkie vedomosti: Nº 57 (11 March) and other newspapers. Subsequently, at the request of Chertkov’s mother, the Tsar postpones his exile from Tula Gubernia until his health improves.
March–April — LNT suffers a bout of illness, rising from bed for the first time on 17 March, and stepping outdoors for the first time on 31 March. By 16 April he is once more riding horseback.
10–13 May — LNT makes the initial drafts of a letter to SAT to be given to her after his death — see his Diary, published in PSS 84: Nº 840.
30 June–1 July — LNT has two meetings with Chertkov (who is forbidden to enter Tula Gubernia) in a village called Suvorovo in Orël Gubernia near Kochety (Gusev II: 697).
6 July — LNT receives an invitation to take part in the XVIII International Peace Congress in Sweden, and a second invitation three days later. On 12 July LNT accepts the invitation, but on 22 July cancels because of SAT’s nervousness and opposition. When she calms down, LNT again contemplates going to Sweden, but this time SAT threatens suicide and LNT abandons the venture.
11 July — LNT is upset with SAT’s intention to sue a publisher who published LNT’s works without her permission (see LNT’s Diary of 12 July). Two days later, however, SAT learns that she has no ownership of LNT’s works and cannot go to court on his behalf. She is seriously upset.
13–14(?) July — LNT asks his sister Marija’s son-in-law, Ivan Vasil’evich Denisenko (1851–1916), to prepare a document stating that he [LNT] is transferring all his works into the public domain. SAT demands ownership of his works be transferred to her (even threatening suicide), but LNT refuses. SAT suffers from neuralgia in her left hand and an inflammation of her left lung.
Late July — LNT makes repeated entries in his Diary about his overwhelming desire to leave home. On 30 July he discusses the possibility with Gusev and makes note of yet another “difficult conversation” with SAT.
3 August — The Tolstoys’ daughter Aleksandra L’vovna goes to visit Chertkov and discuss plans for LNT’s new will.
4 August — Gusev is arrested at Yasnaya Polyana. The following day LNT informs him of his plans to escape from Yasnaya Polyana. On 7 August LNT asks Dr. Makovitskij to clarify how he could leave Russia (Gusev II: 705, 706).
3 September — LNT (with daughter Aleksandra, Makovitskij and Sidorkov) leaves Yasnaya Polyana to visit Chertkov at Krekshino, an estate of the Pashkovs near Moscow; LNT is filmed during his trip to the railway station, and again on 17–18 September.
September–November — At Kochety LNT writes a will stating that after his death the rights to his works created after 1 January 1881 should not be in anybody’s possession and that all his manuscripts should be given to Chertkov (see PSS 80: Nº 394). On 26 October LNT learns that this will is not legally valid. LNT is upset but decides to write a new will and to transfer all his works to the public domain. A week later LNT signs a will conveying all rights to his works to his daughter Aleksandra for subsequent transfer to the public domain (see PSS 80: Nº 394–395).
8 November — SAT drafts her own last will and testament, with no witnesses, and makes a list of materials for her Notes. She also writes about pain in her right eye, which is “almost completely blind” (Dnevniki 2: 296).
SAT’s collection of children’s stories is published under the title The skeleton dolls [Kukolki-skelettsy] (with eight colour illustrations painted by Peredvizhniki [“Itinerants”] artist Aleksandr Viktorovich Moravov (1878–1951). It includes not only her stories The skeleton dolls, but also Grandmother’s treasure-trove [Babushkin klad] and The story of a grivennik [Istorija grivennika], as well as a story composed by her youngest son Ivan, called The rescued dachshund. Vanja’s story [Spasënnyj taks. Rasskaz Vani], and Vanechka: a real occurrence from his life [Vanechka: istinnoe proisshestvie iz ego zhizni].
17 January — Valentin Fëdorovich Bulgakov (1886–1966), a new secretary recommended to LNT by Chertkov, arrives at Yasnaya Polyana. He will personally prevent SAT from committing suicide after her husband’s death, and will help her sort the remnant of LNT’s papers. Later he will compile two volumes of his own memoirs, which have only recently been published in full (see Donskov 2012 and 2014).
29–30 March — Tomáš Masaryk visits LNT at Yasnaya Polyana (see also April 1887 & March 1888 above).
13 April — LNT writes in his Diary: “I awoke at 5 and couldn’t stop thinking how to get away. And I dunno. I thought about writing. Even writing’s a wretched thing, as long as I remain in this life. Talk with her? Leave? Change ever so gradually?.. It seems the latter is the only thing I can do. But it’s still a challenge.”
2–20 May — LNT spends three weeks at Kochety with Chertkov.
19 May — SAT: “I had a difficult conversation with Lev Nikolaevich… He reproached me for our aristocratic lifestyle and for my complaining about the difficulties in managing the household. He chased me out of Yasnaya Polyana [and said I should go] live in Odoev (a city in the western part of Tula Gubernia), or Paris, or somewhere else. I went (out of the house). It was hot, my foot was hurting, my pulse was beating fearfully, I lay down in a ditch and lay there until someone was sent with a horse to look for me. I spent the rest of the day in bed, ate nothing, and wept” (Dnevniki 2: 321).
23 May — LNT receives a new invitation for the XVIII Peace Congress in Sweden, scheduled for 4–6 August. On 12 June LNT declines, citing reasons of poor health (see PSS 82: Nº 58).
29 May — Another difficult conversation takes place between LNT and SAT (Gusev II: 774).
12–23 June — LNT spends two weeks visiting with Chertkov at Otradnoe near Moscow.
Late June — At Yasnaya Polyana, SAT is very nervous about LNT. She sends him several telegrams asking him to come home; he returns to find her (according to his Diary of 23 June) “worse than expected, [in a state of] hysteria and irritation … indescribable”. SAT has been reading LNT’s Diary, and several difficult conversations follow (Gusev II: 780–781).
26 June — SAT writes in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 119): “My life with Lev Nikolaevich is becoming more unbearable by the day because of his heartlessness and cruelty toward me. And this is all the fault of Chertkov, gradually and consistently over a period of time. He has taken hold of this unfortunate old man any way he can, he has separated us from each other, he has killed the spark of artistry in Lev Nikolaevich and kindled the condemnation, hatred and denial which I have sensed in Lev Nikolaevich’s articles these past few years, which he had written under the influence of a stupid evil genius.”
28 June — Chertkov visits LNT. Then LNT and SAT leave to visit their son Sergej at Nikol’skoe-Vjazemskoe for his birthday.
29–30 (night) June — The Tolstoys are back to Yasnaya Polyana.
30 June — Chertkov visits Yasnaya Polyana again. SAT is nervous.
1 July — Following another visit by Chertkov, SAT writes a letter to him (as well as tells him verbally) to return LNT’s diaries (Dnevniki 2: 127): “Chertkov peppered our whole conversation with obscenities and coarse thoughts. For example, he would cry: ‘You’re afraid that I will expose you through the diaries. If I wanted to, I could throw as much smut (quite an expression for a supposedly decent man) at you and your family as I liked.’ […] Chertkov also snapped that if he were married to a wife like me he would have either shot himself or run off to America. Later, on coming down the stairs with our son Lëva, Chertkov maliciously said regarding me: ‘I don’t understand a woman who has been involved all her life in murdering her husband.’ It must have been a pretty slow murder if my husband’s already 82. And he persuaded Lev Nikolaevich that this was so, and that is why we are unhappy in our senior years. […] I have lost my long-time influence and love for ever, unless the Lord has mercy on me.”
2 July — Chertkov’s mother, Countess Elisaveta Ivanovna Chertkova (née Chernyshëva-Kruglikova, 1832–1922), a follower of the popular preacher Lord Radstock, visits Yasnaya Polyana.
7 July — SAT changes to a more positive tone in this diary entry (Dnevniki 2: 134): “Evening. No, Lev Nikolaevich has not yet been taken away from me, thank God! All my sufferings, all my energy of fervent love for him have broken the ice that was separating us these past days. Nothing can stand up to the heartfelt link between us; we are tied together by a long life and a solidly grounded love. I went up to see him as he was going to bed and said to him: ‘Promise me that you will never slip away from me quietly, on the sly.’ He responded: ‘I have no plans to do that, and promise you that I shall never leave you; I love you’ — and his voice trembled. I started crying. I embraced him, saying how afraid I was of losing him, that I fervently loved him, and despite the guilty and silly distractions over the course of my life, I never for a moment ceased loving him more than anyone else in the world, right into his old age. Lev Nikolaevich said that the feeling was mutual, and that I had nothing to worry about, that the link between us was too great for anyone to break. And I felt that this was true, and I began to feel happy. I went to my room, but returned once more to thank him for lifting the stone from my heart.”
11 July — LNT writes to his daughter Aleksandra, asking her not to reproach SAT (see PSS 82 Nº 85).
12 July — LNT sends his coachman to Teljatinki, asking Goldenvejzer to come to Yasnaya Polyana, but the coachman, by mistake, summons Chertkov instead, greatly upsetting SAT. See his letter to SAT, PSS 84: Nº 831.
14 July — SAT notes in her diary (Dnevniki 2: 144–145): “Lev Nikolaevich came in, and I told him with fearful emotion that the return of the diaries hung in one side of the balance, my life in the other. It was up to him to choose. And he chose — thank God he did — to get the diaries back from Chertkov. […] For three days straight I had had nothing to eat, and that for some reason alarmed everyone, but that was the least of it… The crux of the matter was in [my] passion and strength of [my] irritation. ¶I very much regret and repent that I also irritated my children, Lëva and Tanja — especially Tanja. Once again she was so loving, compassionate and kind toward me! I love her very much. I need to allow Chertkov to visit us, even though to me he is very, very difficult and unpleasant. If I don’t permit these meetings, there will be a whole litany of secret, fraternal correspondence, which is even worse.”
14 July — On LNT’s instructions, daughter Aleksandra goes to Teljatinki and obtains from Chertkov seven volumes of LNT’s diaries for 10 years (1900–1910). SAT demands the Diaries be turned over to her, but daughter Tat’jana (Sukhotina) deposits LNT’s diaries in a Tula bank under his name.
17 July — LNT visits Chertkov for the last time. He re-writes his will which, however, will turn out to contain legal inaccuracies and will need to be revised. A few days later, behind his wife’s back LNT signs a codicil to his will, bequeathing his inheritance to his daughter Aleksandra. He also discusses with Aleksandra the possibility of leaving Yasnaya Polyana with her (see Gusev II: 789).
19 July — Two doctors advise LNT and SAT to separate for a while. SAT is very upset. A week later LNT writes to Chertkov about the need to stop their meetings in order to calm SAT (see PSS 89: Nº 897).
26 July — SAT starts to suspect that LNT has written a new secret will. On the following day she describes in her Diary her fears of a conspiracy against her on the part of LNT and Chertkov to deprive her of her rightful inheritance (see Dnevniki 2: 159).
29 July — LNT begins a new “Diary for himself”, in effect regretting the struggle he has been drawn into by Chertkov. He resolves to try a more loving approach with SAT.
2 August — LNT discusses his new will with Birjukov, who disapproves of its secrecy.
3 August — A very hostile conversation erupts between LNT and SAT (see LNT’s Diary; also Gusev II: 793–94 and Bulgakov: 337–338). On the same day SAT wrote in her Diary: “I wanted to explain to Lev Nikolaevich the reason for my jealousy of Chertkov and showed him a page from a diary he had written in his youth, back in 1851, where he said that he had never fallen in love with women, but had many times fallen in love with men. I thought that he, like P. I. Birjukov and Dr. Makovitskij, would understand my jealousy and calm me down, but instead he went all white and displayed such a fury that I had not seen in a long, long time” (Dnevniki 2: 166).
6 August — LNT writes in his Diary: “I’m thinking of going away, leaving a letter for her. I’m afraid for her, though I think she would be better off [if I left].” Two weeks later he writes: “Now it’s come to me, remembering our wedding, that there was something fateful [right then]: I wasn’t ever even in love. But I couldn’t help but get married.”
1 September — LNT writes a letter to SAT (PSS 84: Nº 833) “pouring out his heart” to her. (LNT’s Diary)
2 September — At Yasnaya Polyana, SAT organises a church service in LNT’s rooms in order “to expel Chertkov’s spirit”; she also removes all Chertkov’s portraits from LNT’s bedroom.
24 September — LNT notes in his Diary: “They are tearing me apart.”
25 September — The last photo of LNT and SAT together is taken.
28 September — While out riding LNT meets Chertkov accidentally. Ten days later, at SAT’s invitation, Chertkov visits Yasnaya Polyana for the last time.
12 October — SAT learns about LNT’s new will. She declares in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 212–213): “Today I told Lev Nikolaevich that I knew about his arrangement. He had a pitiful, guilty look and was evasive the whole time. I said that it was wrong for him to sow evil and contention, that the children would not give up their rights without a fight. And it was painful for me to see that over the grave of a loved person could arise so much evil, reproaches, court cases and difficulties! Yes, it was an evil spirit that was arming the hand of this Chertkov — he wasn’t named after the devil for nothing!” (In Russian the name Chertkov includes the word for ‘devil’ — chert.)
13 October — SAT expounds her feelings in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 213–14): “The thought of suicide is growing in me again, and more forcefully than before. Now it feeds on silence. […] Life is becoming unbearable. It’s like living under bombs dropped by Mr. Chertkov. […] And it is this despotism that has enslaved an unfortunate old man. Besides, back in his youth, when he wrote in his diary that he was in love with one of his chums, the main thing was he tried to please him and not irritate him. In fact one time he spent eight months of his life in Petersburg for this very reason… He’s doing the same thing now. He thinks he has to please this idiot’s emotions and obey his every whim.”
28 October — LNT finally leaves home (secretly, during the night) and goes first to his sister Marija in her convent in Shamordino, leaving a letter for SAT (PSS 84: Nº 837). From Shamordino he pens his last letter to SAT (Nº 839).
31 October — LNT leaves Shamordino; while on a train, he develops a high fever and stops at the Astapovo railway station, where the stationmaster gives him shelter in his own house.
7 November — LNT dies of pneumonia at Astapovo. Two days later he is laid to rest at Yasnaya Polyana.
9 November — SAT makes this frank declaration in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 225–226): “What happened on the 26th and 27th [of October] was not recorded, but on 28 October, at 5 o’clock in the morning, Lev Nikolaevich stole out of the house along with [his doctor] D. P. Makovitskij. The excuse for his flight was that I had supposedly gone through his papers at night, and even though I did drop into his study for a moment, I did not touch a single paper; indeed, there were no papers on his desk. In a letter to me (for the whole world), his excuse was [to extricate himself from] a luxurious lifestyle and a desire to escape to solitude — to live in a hut like the peasants.” LNT himself had written in his farewell letter: “I can no longer live in such luxurious conditions as I did, and I am doing what old men of my age usually do: they forsake worldly life to live out their remaining days in solitude and quietude.” (PSS 84: Nº 404; also Dnevniki 2: 509, Note 155) SAT continues: “Having learnt from Sasha and the letter of Lev Nikolaevich’s flight, I threw myself into the pond in despair. Alas, Sasha and Bulgakov pulled me out. After that I did not eat for five days, but on the 31st of October at 7.30 in the morning I received a telegram from the offices of Russkoe slovo: LEV NIKOLAEVICH SICK AT ASTAPOVO STOP FORTY DEGREE FEVER. Our son Andrej and daughter Tanja and I went by emergency train from Tula to Astapovo. I was not permitted to see Lev Nikolaevich; they were holding him by force; they had locked the doors, tearing my heart”. At this point LNT was in the company of his daughters Tat’jana [Tanja], Aleksandra [Sasha] and his son Sergej [Serëzha]. His doctor, Dushan Makovitskij — along with two colleagues — made the following statement in “Medical conclusions regarding the death of L. N. Tolstoy”: “At a family consultation, in agreement with the doctors’ advice, it was decided that no other relative would be allowed to see Lev Nikolaevich, since there was reason to believe that the appearance of new people would upset Lev Nikolaevich, which could have a fatal effect on his life, which was hanging by a thread.” (Dnevniki 2: 509–510, Note 157)
10 November — SAT falls ill herself; her illness lasts until the end of November.
15 November — SAT notes in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 330): “My son Serëzha, Mar’ja Aleksandrovna, Bulygin and Ge spent the day with me. [My daughter] Sasha came, and she and I got along well. I did a lot of crying. My final separation from Lev Nikolaevich was unbearable.”
16 November — SAT writes in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 330): “The whole village of Yasnaya Polyana — peasant men, women and children — gathered today at the grave on the fortieth day of Lev Nikolaevich’s passing, which we fixed up and decorated with fir branches and wreaths. Three times they fell to their knees, doffed their caps and sang ‘Eternal memory’ [Vechnaja pamjat’]. I found myself crying and suffering a lot, but at the same time I was heartened by the people’s love. And how affectionate they all were toward me. I wrote my sister Tanja, my daughter Tanja, Il’ja and Andrjusha. [I felt] lonely and burdened!”
SAT publishes a twenty-volume edition of LNT’s works, in which she attempts to correct a series of earlier errors by carefully checking the text against LNT’s original manuscripts (Childhood, The raid, The Kreutzer Sonata).
January — The Tolstoys’ daughter Aleksandra sends out a notarised document forbidding SAT access to the room in the Historical Museum containing family documents and ordering her to cease publication of the latest edition of LNT’s works. SAT files a counter-suit. (See entry under 18 December 1914 below.)
10 May & 18 November — SAT twice petitions the Tsar with an appeal to have Yasnaya Polyana acquired as State property. In her first appeal she writes as follows: “The passing of my husband, Count L. N. Tolstoy, and his will, have so impoverished his large family, consisting of seven children and twenty-five grandchildren, that some are no longer in a position either to bring up or even to feed their children. It is with heartfelt pain that we recognise the necessity of selling the valuable estate the deceased willed to us before his death — an estate near the village of Yasnaya Polyana consisting of 885 desjatinas [1 desjatina = 1.09 hectares]. We no longer have any possibility of maintaining it in our family. In any case, even though selling off the land in small lots would be financially advantageous to us, we find that prospect exceedingly distasteful, as the birthplace and burial site of a man so dear to us could easily fall into obscurity. It is our fervent wish to hand over his ‘cradle and grave’ to the protection of the State. It is this motivation, along with our cramped financial status, that emboldens us to resort to the mercy of your Imperial Majesty in petitioning you to allow the acquisition of Yasnaya Polyana as State property. Through such mercy granted by you, Your Majesty, my many grandchildren would be afforded the opportunity to receive an education. They would grow up conscious of their undying gratitude to our benevolent Tsar who has generously extended his hand to assist them and their parents, as well as an aggrieved and impoverished widow.” (T. V. Komarova, “Angel Jasnoj Poljany” [The angel of Yasnaya Polyana]. Pamjatniki Otechestva Nº 28 (1992): 91.) The State declines SAT’s request for purchase, but the Tsar offers her a considerable pension. See also the entry for 15-20 April 1918 below.
13 May — SAT goes to the Moscow City Duma [Council] to see council head, Nikolaj Ivanovich Guchkov (1860–1935), about selling the Khamovniki house to the city. On 28 May it is announced in the press that the Council of Ministers has decided to purchase Yasnaya Polyana for 500,000 roubles.
28 August — SAT makes special note in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 355) of LNT’s birthday: “There were about 300 visitors to the house and many of them at the gravesite. I didn’t go. It was hard for me to see so many policemen and at the same time so little genuine feeling for Lev Nikolaevich.”
7 November — SAT records in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 363): “A sad day — the day Lev Nikolaevich died [one year ago]. All my sons came, except Lëva. We had a flood of reporters, members of the Tolstoy Society — about 500 visitors in all. Our peasants came to see me, and sang “Eternal memory” over the grave. My granddaughter Tanjushka Sukhotina was with me. There was a lot of bustle, talk about selling Yasnaya Polyana, and heaviness on my heart.”
SAT’s article L. N. Tolstoy’s marriage [Zhenit’ba L. N. Tolstogo] is published in Russkoe slovo (Nº 219) and Reminiscences (on The power of darkness) in Tolstovskij ezhegodnik [Tolstoy annual]. She publishes an article “Pervoe predstavlenie komedii L. N. Tolstogo «Plody prosveshchenija»” [First performance of LNT’s comedy “The fruits of enlightenment”] in Solntse Rossii (Nº 145). In addition, she continues her work on My Life, reads all the articles she can about LNT and receives visitors.
21 April — SAT sells all her unsold edition copies to Ivan Dmitrievich Sytin (1851–1934), a Russian publisher who printed books for Posrednik, a publishing firm set up in 1884 jointly by LNT and Chertkov.
28 August — In her Diary SAT once again takes note of LNT’s birthday, mentioning her visit to his grave accompanied by her granddaughter Tanjushka Sukhotina as being “the best moment of the whole day” (Dnevniki 2: 378).
October — SAT goes to see the Minister of Internal Affairs on the matter of the official banning of the film Ukhod velikogo startsa [Departure of a grand old man] (also known as Zhizn’ L. N. Tolstogo [The life of L. N. Tolstoy]) — a 1912 film directed by Jakov Protazanov and Elizaveta Thiman. SAT’s son Lev L’vovich Tolstoj and her sister Tat’jana Andreevna Kuzminskaja were at the first showing in St. Petersburg; it was the first film in Russian history to be banned outright by the censors.
7 November — On the second anniversary of Lev Nikolaevich’s passing, SAT notes (Dnevniki 2: 382): “From early morning there were all sorts of visitors to the house and the grave, [including] police, cinematographers, reporters and the general public. My son Andrjusha came, later Serëzha. Toward evening, after everyone had gone, I walked to the grave with Andrjusha. Serëzha went on his own.”
13 December — SAT reprises the “very challenging” task of transcribing and editing all LNT’s letters to her throughout their married life (see Dnevniki 2: 383).
SAT prepares and publishes Letters of Count L. N. Tolstoy to his wife 1862–1910 [Pis’ma grafa L. N. Tolstogo k zhene 1862–1910], with commentaries. A second edition appears in 1915.
SAT publishes Four visits by Count L. Tolstoy to the Optina Pustyn’ Monastery [Chetyre pose-shchenija gr. L. Tolstym monastyrja Optina pustyn’] in Tolstovskij ezhegodnik.
March — SAT buys from her sons the portions of Yasnaya Polyana belonging to them, amounting to 200 desjatinas.
22 March — SAT visits Gaspra (in the Crimea), accompanied by Julija Igumnova (see October 1900 above) and remarks in her Diary on the beauty of the surroundings (Dnevniki 2: 389; see also My Life, VIII.18).
July — At the request of Semën Afanas’evich Vengerov (1855–1920), Director of the Russian Book Chamber [Rossijskaja knizhnaja palata] and a close friend of LNT’s, SAT agrees to write a short Autobiography, which she completes by the end of October 1913.
7 November — SAT once again makes a Diary entry (Dnevniki 2: 400) on the anniversary of LNT’s death: “It’s been three years now, and still painful! The day went well. As soon as I got up I went to the grave, where a variety of visitors had already gathered. Later about a hundred people came to the house, mostly young people. Four of my sons came: Serëzha, Il’ja, Andrjusha and Misha.”
May — SAT compiles an inventory of books and objects room by room, cupboard by cupboard, which she records in an oilcloth-covered notebook. On the inside front cover she writes in black ink: “List compiled and checked by S. A. Tolstaja, May 1914.” (See also May–June 1918 below.)
Summer — SAT’s daughter Aleksandra (Sasha) goes off to war as a nurse. Her son Lev becomes a Red Cross representative. Her son Il’ja becomes a correspondent for the paper Russkoe Slovo, while her son Mikhail goes off to war.
9 August — A telegram is received concerning the death of SAT’s son-in-law Mikhail Sergeevich Sukhotin. SAT goes to Kochety to comfort her daughter Tat’jana.
18 December — SAT’s access to LNT’s manuscripts which were transferred to the Historical Museum in 1904 (see 12 January 1904 above) is restored by a Senate decree; access was cut off after his death as a result of a dispute which had broken out between SAT and her daughter Aleksandra L’vovna, to whom LNT had left them in his will. (See entry under January 1911 above.)
28–29 January — SAT once again gives Tolstoy’s manuscripts to the Rumjantsev Museum for preservation. Pursuant to her appeal to the Museum’s director on 26 January and his reply the next day, SAT organises a special room in the Museum called “Tolstoy’s study”.
7 June — SAT receives word about the death of her composer-friend Sergej Ivanovich Taneev.
11 February — SAT receives word about her son Andrej’s illness. He dies on 24 February.
November — SAT’s son Il’ja goes to America to give lectures on LNT; her son Lev heads to Japan for the same reason. SAT ceases writing My Life (which by this point has reached the end of 1901).
5 March — SAT writes in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 443): “A red-letter day for Yasnaya Polyana. Workers came from the cast-iron foundry at Kosaja Gora, bringing red flags and pins to do reverence to Tolstoy’s house and widow. Carrying portraits of Lev Nikolaevich, they walked to his grave through deep snow and biting winds. My two Tat’janas walked with them. The workers sang, made speeches, all about freedom. In response I made a brief speech too about Lev Nikolaevich’s legacy. At the grave they sang Vechnaja pamjat’ and took snapshots.”
30 April — SAT comments in her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 445) on the number of soldiers visitng Yasnaya Polyana, who have treated her and her daughter Tanja “very kindly”, though she is concerned about running out of provisions for the family and their livestock.
Mid-to-late October — SAT records several instances of soldiers and police sent in to protect the family and the estate, in view of the widespread instances of arson in the area (Dnevniki 2: 452).
29 December — In a newspaper article Valentin Bulgakov (LNT’s last secretary) writes: “The preservation of the historic estate is now guaranteed more than ever before. […] The protection of Yasnaya Polyana is under the direct care of Tula political organisations, which have appointed a special constant guard to keep watch over the estate… The inhabitants of the estate are being supplied with food provisions… Just a few days ago a telephone was installed, connecting Yasnaya Polyana with Tula and Moscow… The shadow of Lev Nikolaevich is covering it and, hopefully, protecting it” (Dnevniki 2: 593, Note 2).
15–20 April (N. S.) 146[?] — On the basis of a decision by the Council of People’s Commissars [abbreviated in Russian as Sovnarkom] of 30 March, the Gubernia Conference on Land Apportionment adopts a resolution “on the recognition of L. N. Tolstoy’s Yasnaya Polyana estate as not being subject to apportionment among the citizens of neighbouring village and its function as an historical treasure to be used only for cultural and educational purposes”. At first the local peasants accept this decision, then decide to take over the land in any case, but later change their minds again (see Dnevniki 2: 594–595). Note that dates from this point on will be given according to the New-Style (Gregorian) calendar, adopted by the new Bolshevik régime in February 1918.
3 September — SAT writes a new will to include her daughter Aleksandra L’vovna [Sasha] among her inheritors. “I had excluded her earlier on account of her horrible treatment of me after the death of her father. I have now forgiven her” (Dnevniki 2: 463).
1 February — SAT confides to her Diary (Dnevniki 2: 468–469): “I spent the whole day writing a commentary to [LNT’s] Letters of Count L. N. Tolstoy to his wife [Pis’ma grafa L. N. Tolstogo k zhene]. I became very depressed reading some of the letters he had written to me, in which I could feel his sufferings caused by my reproaches, my demands for him to stay with me, and so forth. My desire not to separate from my husband grew, after all, out of my love for him! I loved him very much right to the end of my life.”
2 February — SAT and her daughter Tat’jana L’vovna appeal to the board of the educational Yasnaya Polyana Society with a request to transfer the management of the estate and its buildings to this same Society. Their request is granted, and the management is entrusted to Prince Nikolaj Leonidovich [Kolja] Obolenskij (see Dnevniki 2: 599, Note 8). Yasnaya Polyana remains under the Society’s management up until 1921, when the All-Russian Central Executive Committee [Vserossijskij Tsentral’nyj Ispolnitel’nyj Komitet/VTsIK] decides to nationalise the estate.
14 July — SAT writes a letter to be read after her death: “Apparently the circle of my life is closing, I am gradually dying, and I wanted to tell everyone with whom I have been living recently and before, Farewell and forgive me. ¶Farewell, my dear, beloved children, especially my daughter Tanja, whom I love more than anyone else in the world, whom I ask forgiveness for all the difficulties she had to endure on account of me. ¶Forgive me, my daughter Sasha, that I did not give you sufficient love, and I thank you for your kind treatment of me these last times.
¶Forgive me, too, my sister Tanja, for not being able, despite my immeasurable love for you, to make your life easier and comforting you in your lonely and difficult situation. I ask Kolja to forgive me for being sometimes unkind to him. No matter what the circumstances might have been, I ought to have better understood his difficult and challenging situation and treated him more kindly. Forgive me, too, all of you who have served me over my lifetime; I thank you all for your service. I have a special relationship with you, my dear, fervently beloved granddaughter Tanjushka. You made my life especially joyful and happy. Farewell, my darling! Be happy; I thank you for your love and tenderness. Do not forget your grandmother who loves you, S. Tolstaya.” (Dnevniki 2: 600, Note 18)
8 October — In a memo to the Council of People’s Commissars adopted at a special session of the Yasnaya Polyana Society, the Society warns about the danger of the estate falling into a war zone given the presence of General Denikin’s army on the southern front. The Central Executive Committee issues a corresponding order and the Red Army troops which have gathered in the village of Yasnaya Polyana are withdrawn.
4 November — SAT dies at Yasnaya Polyana from inflammation of the lungs. She is buried in the family cemetery at Nikol’skij Church in the neighbouring village of Kochaki.