![]() ![]() Sophia Tolstoy self-portrait at Yasnaya Polyana, June 1901.īoth Husband and wife used their diaries to communicate, saying things they didn't dare say aloud to one another: ![]() "She copied his manuscripts and he listened to her opinions, which was very gratifying to her," Bendavid-Val says. They used their diaries to talk to each other. "They were madly in love when they got married in 1862, and they shared everything, including their diaries. The Tolstoys' marriage started off "in a beautiful way," Bendavid-Val tells Deborah Amos. For example, in War and Peace, the heroine Natasha is modeled after Sophia's younger sister, Tanya. Leah Bendavid-Val, author of Song Without Words: The Photographs and Diaries of Countess Sophia Tolstoy, says Sophia's family provided Leo Tolstoy with characters for his books. And he had little sympathy with her interests in music and photography. She was an invaluable assistant in his work, hand copying his manuscripts.īut Sophia, a countess from Russia's aristocracy, was impatient with Tolstoy's ideas about social reform and a simpler life. He and his wife, Sophia, had 13 children together. Tolstoy's own marriage seems to have fallen into the second category. ![]() One of the most famous sentences in literature is the opening of Leo Tolstoy's novel Anna Karenina: "All happy families are alike each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." Sophia's grandson Volodya Tolstoy in February 1903. ![]()
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