Unpopular with government

Leo Tolstoy’s earliest stories criticise war and the inequality that exists between men. As with most writers, his work is heavily censored and he is monitored by the authorities, especially after visiting certain political exiles in 1861 during his second trip to Europe. Many men born into the aristocracy become part of the mechanism of government but he does not take this path except for short periods when he serves as a magistrate in Tula and as an arbiter of the peace to help settle disputes during the emancipation of the serfs.

Almost certainly prompted by disgruntled property owners, police raid Yasnaya Polyana in 1862 while Tolstoy is away. They expect to find revolutionary materials being printed in secret on printing press and his schools acting as breeding grounds for anti-Government feeling. Despite searching for two days they find nothing except some subversive writings by one of the school teachers. Tolstoy is incensed at the intrusion and complains bitterly to Alexandra Tolstoy by letter. He often does this when angered by the actions of the authorities. She is in the service of the court, as maid of honour to the sister of Alexander II, and he sees her as being in the enemy camp. “Fine friends you have! ... One of your friends, a filthy colonel, read all my letters and diaries which I thought to entrust to the person closest to me only before my death ...” he writes. “If you will recall my political attitude you will know that always, and especially since my love for the school, I have been entirely indifferent to the Government, and even more indifferent to the present liberals whom I scorn with all my soul. Now I can no longer say this. I possess bitterness and revulsion, almost hatred for that dear Government” (p190, Tolstoy, Wilson). Eventually he is told he will not suffer such inconvenience again. He and Alexander often have heated discussions about religion too.

In 1881 after many previous attempts on his life, Alexander II is assassinated. This is the Tsar who ended the Crimean War, allowed those who tried to bring down the autocracy in the early part of the century to return, emancipated the serfs and was planning to introduce a constitution. His assassination illustrates the level of revolutionary feeling brewing in Russia. Imbued with his new sense of Christian spirituality, Tolstoy asks the new Tsar to pardon his father’s murderers. Russia in the 1800s is governed by the autocracy, which is peopled by the aristocracy, but being born into that class only protects Tolstoy for so long: he has immunity early on but is now seen as dangerous. Nevertheless he is never banished as other writers are. The six murderers hang.

Tolstoy is not directly supporting the revolutionary movement or aligned with a particular organisation – except the Tolstoyans – but the authorities know that those agitating for change are quick to rally around him, recognising him as a hero of the common people. They also know that he has great influence both within Russia and outside its borders. At that time the industrial revolution is also shifting the foundations of society.

The older Tolstoy gets the more fearless he becomes. During his work to help the starving in 1891 he antagonises the government by writing about the government’s ineptitude in the international media. A few years later he is taunting a new Tsar, Nicholas II, about the treatment of the religious sect the Dukhobors – it is this issue which leads to Vladimir Chertkov being sent into exile. In 1901 he writes to Nicholas II telling him to give Russia its freedom to avert a civil war. The autocracy is a superannuated form of government, he says. This may suit an isolated Central African tribe but not the Russian people, who are increasingly engaging with the rest of the world. He writes to object to the way peasants are being hung for their revolutionary activities.

He never comes up with an overall plan for the organisation of society but seems to believe that if everyone aims to reach spiritual enlightenment everything else will take care of itself.

Excommunication by the church
Clashes over his inheritance
Death