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The Cossacks
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The Cossacks
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The Cossacks
Ebook240 pages3 hours

The Cossacks

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About this ebook

"The Cossacks" is one of Tolstoy's greatest works. In this semi-autobiographical work we meet the central character of Olenin, a young man of twenty-four who has yet to make anything of himself in life. Olenin joins the Russian army and is assigned to a remote post. There he falls in love with a beautiful young Cossack woman who has already been promised to another man, a Cossack warrior. What will become of Olenin? Will he fight for the love that he has found? Read this gripping narrative set in pre-revolutionary Russia and find out for yourself.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJan 1, 2010
ISBN9781596742284
Author

Leo Tolstoy

Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) is the author of War and Peace, Anna Karenina, The Death of Ivan Ilyich, Family Happiness, and other classics of Russian literature.

Read more from Leo Tolstoy

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Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5/5

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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Quick, wonderful read. Tolstoy's insights into another culture are poignant and relevant. This novel speaks much of the problems of the multinational Russian empire, and maintains its relevance in the modern era's issues of globalization.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    One of Tolstoy's best short stories / novella. Highly readable and exciting, I found this much more enjoyable than Tolstoy's other, more highly praised, Caucus novel "Hadji Murad".
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Considered Tolstoy's best novel from his early years. Begun in 1853 and completed in 1862, after nearly 10 years of fits and starts he was compelled to finish it after loosing badly at cards in order to pay the debt. The novel describes life among the martial Cossacks as seen through the eyes of a young Russian soldier stationed in a native village on the frontier. Descriptions of Caucuses geography and wildlife are the strongest part of the novel in my opinion, the story itself is slow and uneventful. The Cossack's are a clannish community and the outsider Olenin who tries to penetrate it with modest success discovers himself in the process. It's like Dances with Wolves where a soldier who is sent to subjugate and civilize instead discovers indigenous wisdom and attempts to go native, but finds in the end he can never fully cross over and returns a changed man.