"A doctrinaire known for his "heartless indifference to human contingencies," Chertkov made it his mission to bring Tolstoy's entire life and work into accord with the principles of Tolstoyanism. He became Tolstoy's constant companion, and eventually gained editorial control over all his new writings--including the diaries, which treated the Tolstoy's conjugal life in great detail. Sonya [Tolstoy] never forgave her husband. The Tolstoys began to fight constantly, long into the night. Their shouting and sobbing would make the walls shake. Tolstoy would bellow that he was fleeing to America; Sonya would run screaming into the garden, threatening suicide. According to Tolstoy's secretary, Chertkov was succeeding in his plan: to achieve "the moral destruction of Tolstoy's wife in order to get control of his manuscripts." During this stormy period in his marriage, Tolstoy wrote The Kreutzer Sonata--a novella in which a husband resembling Tolstoy brutally murders a wife resembling Sonya. Anyone investigating foul play in the death of Tolstoy would find much of interest in The Kreutzer Sonata." -Elif Batuman, The Possessed
After reading a string of great memoirs, 'Waiting for Snow in Havana' is so cynical and poorly written that I don't think I'm going to finish it. While I wait for my next read to arrive, I started to think about how much I loved Batuman's gem of a memoir. Two things: I'm actually really upset I missed Batuman at Boston College in October and I'm stoked to relax and watch a movie for the first time in a while. That movie, fittingly, will be the Leo Tolstoy biopic, The Last Station.
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