Anna Karenina Lesson Plans and Teaching Resources

PBS Masterpeice Theater: Anna Karenina
Explore Toltstoy's life, Russian society in the second half of the 19th century, literary comparisons, the value of art, and the ideal of family.

Tolstoy's Struggle
The story behind Anna Karenina as a prime example of Tolstoy's search for patterns of meaning in life and struggling with how to express them.

The Roots of the Story
Excerpts from Tolstoy, by Henri Troya
Henri Troyat is a French novelist and biographer of Russian origin, and author of numerous historical novels and biographies of famous Russians, including Tolstoy.

Tolstoy Timeline
Helps students grasp Tolstoy's life in the context of his work and major world events.

Introduction To Tolstoy's Writings by Ernest J Simmons
Ernest J. Simmons was the initiator of Russian Area Studies in the United States, and taught at Cornell, Harvard, and then at Columbia, where he was Professor of Russian Literature and Chairman of the Department of Slavic Languages from 1946 to 1959. He was for a short time Acting Director of the Center for Advanced Studies at Wesleyan University. His full-text literary criticism is available here.

Leo Tolstoy
Created by a Russian Studies graduate (Brigham Young University) and Tolstoy enthusiast, this site features an extensive photo gallery, a brief biography, and a list of Tolstoy etexts, as well as other resources. Offers reading tips for Tolstoy works.

The Last Days of Leo Tolstoy by Vladimir Chertkov
Vladimir Chertkov, close friend and personal secretary of Leo Tolstoy, published this booklet in December, 1910, barely a month after Tolstoy's death.

Some Observations about the Suicide of the Adulteress in the Modern Novel
Explores why in three major male-authored European novels -- Madam Bovary, Anna Karenina, and Therese Raquin -- the protagonists are wives who commit adultery that ends in suicide. Babis Dermitzakis works in the fields of literature and social anthropology at the University of Athens, Greece.

Essays and Interviews (PBS)
Includes essays about the roots of the novel, the status of women in Russian society, and Tolstoy's own challenging marriage.

Leo and Sonya: Tolstoy's Courtship in Fiction and Fact
By Amy Mandelker, Associate Professor of Comparative Literature at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

Tolstoy and the "Woman Question"
Also by Amy Mandelke.

Anna and Levin—Intersecting Lives
By Liza Knapp at the University of California at Berkeley.

Conference abstracts from "The Over-Examined Life: New Perspectives on Tolstoy," Harvard University, April 19-20, 2002

Crosby, Ernest H. "Count Tolstoy as Philosopher, Prophet, and Man," The Arena 25 (April 1901).

Crosby, Ernest Howard. Tolstoy and His Message (New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1903).

Transcript of Radio Discussion on July 27, 1997 with professors of literature at Ohio University, Marilyn Atlas and Edgar Whan (joined by scholar Peter Heidtmann).

Penguin Discussion Questions
Introduces Anna Karenina and offers 20 discussion questions

Leo Tolstoy E-Texts
You can read or download many of his letters and works, including Anna Karenina

Hear the characters' names pronounced in Russian and listen reading of one of Anna Karenina's most famous passages.

Tolstoy Image Gallery

Interactive Anna Karenina character map

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