Volume I, Book III, Chapter XIX

Andrei is still very interested in the lofty sky, feeling a pain in his head and arm, and knowing he’s bleeding. He’s also ”letting out soft, pitiful, and childlike moans” without knowing that he is. He’s lost.
At that moment, a commander and two soldiers ride up, to survey the dead. It’s Napoleon. He was Andrei’s hero, but now Andrei can think of nothing except how ridiculous this all is in comparison to the sky. Napoleon calls them all fine men, and looks at Andrei and says it’s a fine death. He thinks Andrei is dead, but Andrei manages to moan and Napoleon orders him to be taken to the first aid center.
Once there he’s cleaned up a bit, and then paraded in front of Napoleon. Napoleon asks him how he feels, and his response is silence.

The, too, everything seemed so useless and insignificant compated with that stern and majestic way of thinking called up in him by weakness from loss of blood, suffering, and the expectation of imminent death. Looking into Napoleon’s eyes, Prince Andrei thought about the insignificance or grandeur, and about the still greater insignificance of death, the meaning of which no one among the living could understand or explain.”

He is sent to Napoleon’s doctor with the other men. Andrei is given back the icon Marya gave him, and he wishes that faith and god for him could be so simple. Then when the stretchers moved he is jolted back to pain, begins mixing all his memories up, and becomes delirious and confused, finally ending up in unconsciousness. Larrey, Napoleon’s physician, thinks he’ll die, and hands him over to the local villagers.

End of Volume I

What’s going to happen? It’s awful to say, and certainly with the hindsight of history, but you do want to say to Andrei “just get over this Napoleon thing and this romance of war”, but he had to do that himself. Tolstoy in the last couple chapters hasn’t shied away from the graphic, with the 40 or so people drowning in a mob rush to water after a general is killed in a pile of wet blood with a cannon shot, to Napoleon’s calling the dead “fine men” while looking over a man face down in the mud with a blackened nape and his stiff arm flung out to one side. His allegiance is with his characters, but he’s beginning to show us the horror and the hollow once they experience it. Still struck by how the armies treat each other with such cordiality when not fighting. It feels very much like a game - from Bagration’s unwillingness to fight so just sending someone in to buy time, to the way the officers and generals speed away - it’s bluster, romance, and disappointment.

I feel like Andrei will pull through, but I hope we get a break from the war for a sec in the next Volume.


And I have to point out that I did this on a train, trying to get to Boston but failing due to flooding in Rhode Island. Nature has a different feeling when you’re at the mercy of it and you’ve been up all night. It felt kind of perfect with this chapter.

Volume I, Book III, Chapter XVIII

This chapter is sad. And I'm on my way to go to the airport to catch a red-eye, so this will be short.

Nikolai gets confused, going into where the battle is, as he's told Kuzutov and the Emperor have been killed, and then that they haven't. No one knows where they are, but it's clear that they've lost. The troops are in disarray.

In the middle of a field that the French have ceased shooting at since it's covered with dead, Nikolai sees the Emperor. He is overtaken, and T says "as a young man in love trembles and thrills" he is too terrified to talk to him. He figures he should be left alone to mourn the loss, and as he rides away he sees a Captain go up, help him across a ditch, and talk to him soulfully. This just makes him sadder. He goes into the village to find Kuzutov.

Meanwhile, near a patch of ice, Dolokhov (now an officer) is injured and leads a group of people onto some ice to cross a dam. Cannons are firing all around, and his regimental commander gets smashed by a cannonball. The ice begins to crack, but at this point the crowd is screaming at everyone to go into it, so people are rushing in, ice is breaking, cannons are firing and people are getting killed left and right.

Yikes.

Volume I, Book III, Chapter XVII

So Bagration is annoyed at the order given to him by Dolgorukov to begin action, so instead he sends a scout to where Kuzutov and the Emperor are, knowing since it's six miles it will take him all day to just go and come back. He looks over and sees eager Nikolai.

The rest of the chapter is Nikolai running into fighting. He gets more and more confused at where the shots are coming from. At one point, he almost gets trampled by the horse guard stampeding toward the French (he later hears only 18 of them survived). I'm a little confused that he's still riding Bedouin, since he bought that other horse from the Frenchman they captured, but I'm sure I'm misunderstanding.

He runs into Boris and Berg, who have fought their first action. He continues on in spite of the danger (I think this is a prerequisite for survival) and sees soldiers confused and shooting at each other through the fog, who later turn out to be Austrians & Russians accidentally shooting each other. He heads on toward the Pratzen Heights, where the just sees French, though he knows that's where the commander is.

Whoops - this can't be good...

Volume I, Book III, Chapter XVI

Short chapter.

Yikes, everyone's getting shot at, the French are closer than anyone thought. Pandemonium. The men begin to flee, and Andrei finally has his moment, where he picks up the standard, and men are falling about him, dying. He keeps charging forward. He feels something hit him on the head, and then he's suddenly aware of the vast sky and clouds. He is happy finally at seeing how wonderful the sky is, and says Thank God....

And that's the end of the chapter. Is he dead? Cliffhanger!

I guess we're supposed to be happy he gets his moment of glory, as Kuzutov has been shot twice and he takes over to try to rally the retreating men. I don't really feel that way. It's quite annoying for some reason to hear him (and Nikolai) just obsess on how great they could look and what kind of glory they can get from this. I guess it's actually deeper, considering they're okay if they die for it, but it really strikes me the wrong way for some reason. I just want to say, "do your job the best you can and quit worrying so much about how great you can look", but I guess Tolstoy's showing us the humanity. I'm sure that's why many soldiers fight. Especially when war was so romanticized. Ah, well, I still like him, just don't love that portion.

I hope he's not dead. To be sure, I flipped forward to see if I could find his name. Shhh. Don't tell anyone.

Volume I, Book III, Chapter XV

Suffice it to say more lining up, more unsurety, more worrying about honor from Andrei and if this would be his day. There's a disagreement between Kuzutov and the Emperor, but Kuzutov starts the troops before they're lined up completely as asked. This 18th century idea of war is just fascinating. That's what they're all carrying with them.

I like how Kuzutov calls Andrei "my dear" when giving him an order. Different time.

More tomorrow, but at this point, even though there's gunfire in and out and a good amount of fog, who know when they'll actually fight.

Volume I, Book III, Chapter XIV

Okay, here's where it gets a little complicated about geography, so to really follow this I'd need a map.

I love how Tolstoy calls the Russian troops "us", as if allegiance is assumed. That's fair, and I kind of like the familiarity.

The soldiers get up and march in the fog. There's a great description of the whole body of soldiers, the way things are communicated as a through water - quickly, and not quite clearly how. In this case, after marching for a bit, and having no officers cheering them on (since they don't want to do this and think it's a bad idea - "as we saw at the council of war"), the soldiers start to get disillusioned. And they blame the confusion on the Germans, "now ascribing the cause of the disorder with particular pleasure and naturalness to the muddleheaded Germans, everyone became convinced that the harmful confusion taking place was the doing of the sausage makers."

Well, at least no one is trafficking in cultural stereotypes.

So they march through the fog, and right into the trap set by Napoleon. The last of the chapter is his enjoying his moment, in no rush, seeing that the Russian army is marching right into a valley, thinking that he's ahead of them, and he can now attack them. There's much more, but that's the basis.

He waves his glove to signal attack, and his men jet off to give the order.

It's an interesting description of war - marching in formations toward hand to hand combat. It's very organized, it seems. The Revolutionary war was not even twenty years before (and not even over in some sense), so that method of fighting obviously had not made it over yet.

Still, within this battle framework, great descriptions of men and what move them.

Book I, Volume III, Chapter XIII

More time before battle. Nikolai is on his horse with the hussars, in a mist, unable to tell where he is going. Furthermore, he’s falling asleep, so there is an ongoing accounting of his fantasy of pleasing the sovereign and other flashes from his life.

Suddenly, there are noises and fires that are confusing. Bagration tells him to ride up, when he volunteers, to see if there are still sentries posted where they were. They’re still there, and shoot at him. Dolgorukov keeps saying they’re in retreat, with just a small group making noise in the rear to cover it up. Rostov asks to be put in the front line for the battle tomorrow, hopefully to serve the Sovereign. Dolgorukov asks when told his name if he is Ilya Andreich’s son. He does not answer.

Then we’re given the text of a letter from Napoleon, who tells his troops he will lead them himself. The noise is the troops lighting things on fire and celebrating his walking among them (as fired up as Nikolai is – I wonder if that’s where “fired up” comes from). Napoleon knows that they are going attack, and will expose their flank. I do not have high hopes for this battle.

I love one point in this chapter when Nikolai is saying how he would love to kill for the sovereign, but not only kill, but bring the prisoner before the sovereign and slap him in the face. It seems almost comical now, but was obviously quite the shaming. How times have changed.