What book helps understand Slavonic soul? Recommendation by Russian man of art

MINSK, 21 November (BelTA) – What book helps understand the Slavonic soul has been covered by Honored Worker of Arts of Russia Aleksandr Adabashyan in a recent episode of BelTA’s YouTube project On Point.

According to the artist, Leo Tolstoy’s novel War and Peace is that book. He noted that in this book three types of families can be tracked. They are still relevant today despite the fact that the way of life has changed since then.

“The Rostov family is not particularly intelligent, not very educated. They are broad-minded and clueless and go bankrupt in the end. There are amazing relationships within this family. It is, excuse my language, a family of complete knuckleheads. Another family is the Bolkonskys. They are serious. They torment each other, love each other, but at the same time this love cannot be spoken about. It is expressed in completely wild forms like the old prince’s love for his daughter. He torments her and understands it. And she understands that she is suffering, but they cannot break away from each other. And Andrei, who is attached to this family, seems to understand everything, on the one hand. And the third family is the Kuragins. They are kind of a clan. They are a corporation. The father happily marries his daughter off to the rich groom Bezukhov. He couldn’t care less what their relationship is like, but he understands that it is the right thing to do. He also makes arrangements for his son, perfectly understanding who it is and what it is. There are no emotional relations between them. There is not a single scene between Prince Vasily and his son or Prince Vasily and Helene. They talk only business. They nearly go as far as making appointments to see each other. They meet only if there is a functional need to meet because some things need discussing. And the mother is completely absent. We never see or hear her. And these three types of families, one might say, still exist today. Certainly, they have changed and the scope is not the same and the scale is not the same, but the principle of these relationships inside families remains,” Aleksandr Adabashyan opined.