Tolstoy as Historian: The Historical Novel in Intellectual History - Session 7: The Soul of a Nation

Location: Bursar's Study, All Souls College

Date and time: Thursday, November 26, from 5–6pm

Conveners: Mrinalini Sisodia Wadhwa (All Souls, History) | Cameron Bowman (Keble, History)

Readings:

• Mandatory reading: War and Peace, Volume II, Part 4

• Optional reading: Introduction to Orlando Figes, Natasha’s Dance: A Cultural History of Russia (PDF in this folder)

  • [More optional: Tolstoy, “The Bear Hunt” (1888, link)]

     

Our reading group took its inspiration from Virginia Woolf’s observation in A Room of One’s Own that “the overflow of George Eliot’s capacious mind should have spread itself… upon history and biography.” How did the historical novel itself offer an alternative means of writing history—one that was crystalizing alongside the discipline of history itself? We began in TT26 with Eliot’s Middlemarch, and will now be spending MT26 and HT27 on Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace, before returning to Eliot in TT27 for Romola. We are open to all students, postholders, and local community members—no background in history or literature is required.

About this term: We are using the 2007 translation of War and Peace by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (available at Blackwell’s, Waterstones, Penguin, the Bodleian, and local charity shops). PDFs of all optional readings can be found in this folder. The conveners will begin each discussion with a short presentation on the optional reading and theme to bring everyone up to speed.

Mailing list: To join our mailing list, please contact the conveners, Mrinalini Sisodia Wadhwa (mrinalini.wadhwa@all-souls.ox.ac.uk) and Cameron Bowman (cameron.bowman@keble.ox.ac.uk).