Happy 143rd Anniversary!

Been thinking today about my favorite author of all time.
On this day in 1862, Count Leo Tolstoy married Sonya (a.k.a. Sophie) Andreyevna Behrs.
He was 34. She was 18. Maybe this rather significant age difference had something to do with their so-soon-to-be-realized mutual incongruity! Well... that and the fact that, for a wedding gift, the well-travelled husband presented the virginal wife with a verse-by-verse chronological history of his extreme profligacy. [Hmmm.... Note to self: DON’T DO THIS!]
Along with producing children at a rate that would make a daschund envious [13 children in 17 years] they would persevere somehow (to 1910) to take the term “till death do us part” to a new level of seriousness.
I have read many biographies of Tolstoy (the best being that of Henri Troyat) and his life is nothing short of extremely fascinating, from start to finish.
But to concentrate specifically on the marriage of these two lovebirds, you can do no better than getting a hold of William L. Shirer’s book [yes, the guy that wrote the monumental Rise and Fall of the Third Reich]... Love and Hatred: The Stormy Marriage of Leo and Sonya Tolstoy. What an amazing book. Fiction could not be made to be this compelling. To call this marriage “stormy” is like calling Hurricane Katrina “a bit of a downpour.”
Perhaps the best way to describe the reciprocal feelings of Leo and Sonya Tolstoy is to quote from their own diary entries.
He said: "Nobody will ever understand me."
She said: "He has never taken the trouble to understand me, and does not know me in the least."
It was a marriage that reached to the highest heights, and sank to the lowest depths... over and over again in each direction. And by seesawing between the extensive diaries of these two "lovers" Shirer takes the reader right into the eye of the storm. One of the most amazing things about this tumultuous marriage is the extensive and meticulous documentation of the participants. And Shirer’s expert collation, skillful narrative sense and detailed endnote pages show that he was well acquainted with the extenuating circumstances of these two lives trying to live as one. The latter half of the book is to be commended for its appropriate emphasis on the disastrous influence of Chertkov, the disciple who became the usurper of Tolstoy's most profound devotion. In my opinion, this busybody named Chertkov gradually became the uncrossable chasm that irreparably separated Leo and Sonya. During this time, Tolstoy's alliance with his daughter Sasha further alienated husband and wife, and Shirer covers this development with great insight. It's all here... from the peace, courtship, and high hopes of Yasnaya Polyana to the final conflict, rejection and despair of Astapovo.
Shirer knew this was to be his last book, and it was. After such a prolific and successful career (14 books and 52 years), to devote his last energies to such a work must imply that he took a special interest in the subject matter. It shows. All of the other books of his I've read have been excellent, and this one is no exception.
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