I'm once again reading Tolstoy's War and Peace. While at the local bookstore, I spotted a new translation that beckoned me to experience the novel again. So far, this Anthony Briggs translation is excellent.

There is no other novel in the world like this one. All that is to be learned about the human condition is in it, but it is entertaining like nothing else is as well. It makes any other story, movie, play or televised series pale in comparison. Tolstoy gets to the heart of conversations, intrigues, expressions and silence. And the reader can see the appearance of the characters, feel their joy and pain, and share their shame and glory. It's incomparable.

Through the descriptions of characters, a reader learns society's rules or identifies with the already known. Lines like: "The viscount was a pleasant-looking young man with gentle features and manners, obviously full of his own importance, but modest enough, because of his good breeding, to indulge any company that he might find himself in." , or "Just as a skillful head waiter can pass off as a supreme delicacy a cut of beef that would be inedible if you'd seen it in the filthy kitchen, Anna Pavlovna served up to her guests that evening first the viscount and then the abbe' as if they were supreme delicacies." allow the reader to perceive the nuanced behavior of social situations perhaps not available to him. In this way a young reader learns as if schooled in this social circle himself.

Of course, the scope and reach of the novel is unparalleled, and the intimacy the reader experiences with a wide range of characters allows a familiarity that could otherwise not occur. Because we learn not only about their actions, but also about their desires and fears, we are able to experience characters in scenes with the eyes of a god. And, because of Tolstoy’s unquestioned genius, we are made privy to earth shattering events peopled with fascinating people that are more than worth our acquaintance.