Step inside Anna Karenina

The film without the cuts. And the book itself.

Anna comes to Moscow to mend her brother’s broken marriage, while the earnest Levin arrives to propose to young Kitty.

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The Cast

Anna Arkadyevna Karenina

Main · Karenin household

A radiant Petersburg woman steps from a railway carriage and changes the emotional gravity of every room she enters.

Locations

Oblonsky house

household

The wife has locked herself away, the husband sleeps in his study, and the children run loose.

Passage

One sentence dares to explain why private misery never looks the same twice.

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The Author’s Pen

Happy and Unhappy Families

Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

Reading

Tolstoy opens his enormous novel with a claim you could argue with all day: that happiness has one shape and misery has infinite ones. It sounds like settled wisdom, the kind of line you nod along to, but it quietly promises that the interesting material lies with the unhappy, and the book that follows is almost entirely about people making themselves miserable in ways no one else could copy. A rule stated so calmly, right before we meet a household falling apart, sets us up to watch how particular each ruin turns out to be.

World Index

The Plot

All Unhappy FamiliesAnna and VronskyLevin on the LandThe Race and the ConfessionForgiveness and New BeginningsAnna's IsolationThe Station and the Stars

The Cast

Anna Arkadyevna KareninaAlexey Kirillovitch VronskyAlexey Alexandrovitch KareninKonstantin Dmitrievitch LevinEkaterina Alexandrovna Shtcherbatskaya / KittyDarya Alexandrovna Oblonskaya / DollyStepan Arkadyevitch Oblonsky / StivaSergei Alexeyitch Karenin / SeryozhaNikolai Dmitrievitch LevinSergey Ivanovitch KoznyshevPrincess Betsy TverskayaCountess Lydia IvanovnaVarenkaPrincess ShtcherbatskayaPrince ShtcherbatskyCountess VronskayaYashvinMarya Nikolaevna "Masha"SerpuhovskoyAgafea MihalovnaThe peasants on Levin's estateMatveyMatrona PhilimonovnaThe Oblonsky childrenMadame StahlVassenka VeslovskyIvan ParmenovIvan Parmenov's wifeMme. KartasovaMlle. Roland

Locations

Church / wedding spaceFinal railway spaceGerman spaKarenin's Petersburg homeLevin and Kitty's childbirth roomLevin's country estateMoscow ballMoscow railway stationMoscow skating groundMowing fields / haying groundsNikolai Levin's sickroomOblonsky housePrincess Betsy's drawing room / Petersburg fashionable societyRacecourseSeryozha's nursery and schoolroomShtcherbatsky homeStiva's government officeTheaterVozdvizhenskoe / Anna and Vronsky's estate

Objects of Note

Anna's black ball dressAnna's fanBaby Dmitri's cradle and linensEstate ledgers / agricultural plansFrou-FrouKarenin's official papersLetters and telegramsLevin's scytheOpera-glassRailway carriageSeryozha's keepsakesStiva's incriminating letterThe chalk proposal tableTheater boxWedding candles / icons

Core Concepts

Every unhappy family is particularFaith is lived before it is understoodLove cannot make a world aloneMarriage is refuge and trapMotherhood is love under pressureSeeing and being seen govern social lifeSociety forgives charm more easily than truthWork tests whether life can be honest

The Author's Pen

Confusion In the Oblonskys’ HouseThe Idiotic SmileForgetting His DespairPretending She Was GoingLevin Takes The ScytheJoy And DreadEveryone Looks Their WayApproaching Her on the IceA Warning About VronskyKitty's Jealous AccusationLoading Hay TogetherLiving For His SoulThe Question In InitialsKitty Asks To GoKitty Alive His Son StrangeLove And ForgivenessNot Knowing How to AskAn Omen of EvilVronsky’s Double LifeA New Expression of HopeTalking Herself Into ForgivenessThe Meaning of GoodnessLove Against DespairWaiting for the MazurkaThe Adoration Of OneThe Baby Has No NameVronsky and Frou FrouA Cruel and Stubborn StruggleWhat He Did Not Want to KnowI Hate YouRolling Into Her ArmsA Consciousness of HypocrisyToo Late to Rise AgainA New World OpenedThe Humiliation One Cannot ForgetAnna Seen AgainKitty Rushing Into ExtremesNothing But Sham

Plot point 01

All Unhappy Families

Anna comes to Moscow to mend her brother’s broken marriage, while the earnest Levin arrives to propose to young Kitty.

Objects of Note

Stiva's incriminating letter

A letter in Dolly's hands turns a family home into a scene of accusation.

The Cast

Alexey Kirillovitch Vronsky

Main · Petersburg aristocratic military circle

A polished officer carries the confidence of a man taught that charm, courage, and pursuit are almost the same virtue.

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Anna Karenina

Leo Tolstoy

The cast, locations, objects of note, core concepts, and selected passages in the Author’s Pen - at your own pace.

One of 127 classics in the Literah library

The Anna Karenina World, as it plays on your phone

Meet the people. 30 characters, each with a portrait, who they are and what they want.
Walk the places. 19 places, each pictured, and what happens there.
Follow the plot. The turns of the story, in order, so you always know where you are.
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