Quest of the Spirit: From Suffering to Acceptance

105. Search & Sacrifice! Tolstoy's "Cossacks" and "Family Happiness"!

                               The Quest for Meaning in Tolstoy's "Family Happiness" and "Cossacks"

         In Tolstoy's "Family Happiness" and "Cossacks," both protagonists search for emotional fulfillment to discover that the sacrifice necessary in achieving it demands a painful, if not lasting, commitment that comes from within. They initially come to the realization that "to live for others was happiness" (174, 73), yet they fail to recognize the price of abandoning oneself entirely for it. In both stories, Tolstoy contrasts the hollow values and pretense of a materialistic Russia with the honesty, faith, and purity of the human heart. In "Family Happiness," a young woman named Marya Alexandrovna experiences the joys and disappointments of living in high society. She earlier had been isolated in her new husband's country estate, and was eager for active life. Only after being pursued by an Italian suitor and preferring the presence of a worldly prince rather than her husband does she realize how near her own moral destruction she truly came. Then, she repents and begins a new phase of love with her husband, a phase which transcends the physical infatuation of their youth. Regrettably, the couple loses that spark of young love, but gain a deeper emotional and spiritual relationship. In contrast, the young hero Olenin in "Cossacks" becomes disillusioned with the high society life of his family, joins the military and goes to live with peasants of northern Russia. There, he discovers what he views as honesty, hard work, and integrity that were absent in the pretense of his earlier life. There, Olenin also meets a young woman named Maryanka whom he loves; yet their backgrounds are too different, and in the end, she rejects him despite her love for him. He then leaves them, a wise yet lonely man; and as he goes, Maryanka's father Eroshka shouts that he will never forget him. She, in turn, continues talking to her father as if nothing had ever occurred. Sadly, the hero departs, feeling abandoned and forgotten like the souls of those buried deep beneath Conrad's cold, indifferent seas. The young man's unfortunate awareness denotes his tragic coming of age. In both stories, Tolstoy's heroes undergo an emotional transformation. In "Family Happiness," Marya Alexandrovna realizes that the true meaning of life comes from an enduring love for her husband and family, and not from the pretense and appearance of wealth and popularity. Tolstoy also emphasizes this truth in War and Peace and Anna Karenina, in both of which the family serves as the moral foundation and consciousness of society. This fact is evident in the successful marriages of Pierre and Natasha, and Maria and Nikolai in War and Peace, and in the union of Levin and Kitty in Anna Karenina. In "The Cossacks," Tolstoy's message is much more pessimistic, as Olenin realizes that he is leaving his true love and a society of men with authentic values, a society that Tolstoy suggests is too far removed from so-called civilized Russia to bridge the gap. Ironically, tragic lovers, like Romeo and Juliet, Olenin and Maryanka live worlds apart, and can never cross over into the world of their dreams. The total surrender of self is as impractical to Olenin as it is unthinkable to Maryanka. Through the use of irony and paradox, Tolstoy wonders if purity of heart, honesty, and integrity are still options for the people of his native Russia, and if so, what are the sacrifices that the new liberal or progressive movement must make in its return to the morals and values of an earlier time. For Olenin and Maryanka, the ideal love is as elusive as it proved for Anna Karenina.

                                  Works Cited for Tolstoy's "Family Happiness" and "The Cossacks"

Tolstoy, Leo. Great Short Works of Leo Tolstoy. John Bayley, Introduction. Louise and Aylmer                       Maude, Trans. New York: Harper & Row, 1967.