Leo Tolstoy was born in 1828 at his family’s estate in Yasnaya Polyana, located approximately 130 miles south of Moscow.  By the age of thirty-three, Tolstoy had squandered a large portion of his inheritance through gambling and partying.  He also had served as an officer in the army and seen the horrors of combat during the Crimean War (1853-56).  While in the artillery corps, Tolstoy began writing a series of semi-autobiographical works. He is best known, however, for the works Anna Karenina and War and Peace.