What Is Art?

by Leo Tolstoy

Overview

This profound analysis of the nature of art is the culmination of a series of essays and polemics on issues of morality, social justice, and religion. Considering and rejecting the idea that art reveals and reinvents through beauty, Tolstoy perceives the question of the nature of art to be a religious one. Ultimately, he concludes, art must be a force for good, for the progress and improvement of mankind.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9789357487580
Publisher:	Double 9 Books
Publication date:	04/01/2023
Pages:	196
Sales rank:	716,279
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.45(d)

About the Author

Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) was a Russian writer and philosopher, best known for his novels "War and Peace" and "Anna Karenina." He was born into an aristocratic family in Tula, Russia, and was educated at home by private tutors. After serving in the army, Tolstoy embarked on a literary career, publishing his first novel, "Childhood," in 1852. Over the course of his career, he became one of the most important figures in Russian literature, and his novels are regarded as classics of world literature. In addition to his literary work, Tolstoy was also a committed social and political activist, and he wrote extensively on issues such as pacifism, anarchism, and the role of the individual in society. He was critical of the Russian Orthodox Church and the state, and his views on these topics led to his excommunication from the church in 1901. Tolstoy's later years were marked by a spiritual awakening, and he became increasingly interested in the teachings of Jesus Christ. He embraced a philosophy of simple living and nonviolence, and his ideas had a profound impact on figures such as Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. Tolstoy died of pneumonia in 1910, but his work continues to be studied and admired around the world for its insight into the human condition and its exploration of complex social and political issues.

Date of Birth:

September 9, 1828

Date of Death:

November 20, 1910

Place of Birth:

Tula Province, Russia

Place of Death:

Astapovo, Russia

Education:

Privately educated by French and German tutors; attended the University of Kazan, 1844-47

Table of Contents

What Is Art? - Leo Tolstoy Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky with a Preface by Richard Pevear

Preface
Bibliographical Note
A Note on the Text

WHAT IS ART? Appendix I
Appendix II
Notes

Editorial Reviews

The effectiveness of What Is Art? lies not so much in its positive assertions as in its rejection of much that was taken for granted in the aesthetic theories of the time.”

literary critic and former Warton Professor of Eng John Bayley

What Is Art? itself is a work of science, though many passages, and even some whole chapters, appeal to us as works of art and we feel the contagion of the author’s hope, his anxiety to serve the cause of truth and love, his indignation (sometimes rather sharply expressed) with whatever blocks the path of advance, and his contempt for much that the ‘cultured crowd,’ in our erudite, perverted society, have persuaded themselves, and would fain persuade others, is the highest art.”

translator Aylmer Maude

Eccentric and lucid, cranky and brilliant, funny and fierce.”

New Criterion

Infuriating, irresistible, aesthetically unaesthetic.”

New Essay on Tolstoy E. Lampert