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Many consider the Russian writer Leo Tolstoy, or Count Lyev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Russian: Лев Никола́евич Толсто́й) (1828 – 1910), one of the world's greatest novelists. In their scope, breadth and vivid depiction of 19th-century Russian life and attitudes, his literary masterpieces War and Peace and Anna Karenina represent, the peak of realist fiction.
Tolstoy's further talents as essayist, dramatist, and educational reformer made him the most influential member of the aristocratic Tolstoy family. In later life, his literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount, caused him to become a fervent Christian anarchist and anarcho-pacifist. His ideas on nonviolent resistance, expressed in such works as The Kingdom of God Is Within You, were to have a profound impact on such pivotal twentieth-century figures as Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.
Brief Biography
- Date of Birth:
- September 9, 1828
- Date of Death:
- November 2, 1910
- Place of Birth:
- Tula Province, Russia
- Place of Death:
- Astapovo, Russia
- Education:
- Privately educated by French and German tutors; attended the University of Kazan, 1844-47
