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Any reader who thoughtfully delves into Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy’s legendary epic novel “War and Peace” encounters images amazing heroes. One of these is Andrei Bolkonsky, an extraordinary man with a multifaceted character.

Description of Andrei Bolkonsky

“...Short stature, a very handsome young man with certain dry features,” is how Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy describes his hero when the reader first meets him at Anna Pavlovna Sherer’s evening. “Everything in his figure, from his tired, bored look to his quiet, measured step, represented the sharpest contrast with his little, lively wife.

Apparently, everyone in the living room was not only familiar to him, but he was so tired of it that looking at them and listening to them was very boring for him...” Most of all, the young man was bored when he saw his wife’s face.

It would seem that nothing at this evening could lift the young man’s spirits, and he perked up only when he saw his friend Pierre Bezukhov. From this we can conclude that Andrey values ​​​​friendship.

The young Prince Bolkonsky is characterized by such qualities as nobility, respect for elders (it is enough to see how he loved his father, calling him “You, father ...”), as well as education and patriotism.

There will come a time of difficult trials in his destiny, but for now he is a young man whom he loves and accepts secular society.

Thirst for fame and subsequent disappointment

Andrei Bolkonsky's values ​​gradually change throughout the novel War and Peace. At the beginning of the work, an ambitious young man strives at all costs to gain human recognition and glory as a brave warrior. “I love nothing but fame, human love. Death, wounds, loss of family, nothing scares me,” he exclaims, wanting to go to war with Napoleon.

We invite you to familiarize yourself with the “characteristics of the Rostov family” in Leo Tolstoy’s novel “War and Peace”

Social life seems empty to him, but the young man wants to be useful to society. At first he serves as Kutuzov’s adjutant, but in the Battle of Austerlitz he is wounded and ends up in the hospital. The family considers Andrei missing, but for Bolkonsky himself this time has become very important for reassessment of values. The young man is disappointed in his former idol Napoleon, seeing him as a worthless man rejoicing in the death of people.

“At that moment Napoleon seemed to him such a small, insignificant person in comparison with what was now happening between his soul and this high, endless sky with clouds running across it.” Now that Bolkonsky’s goal in life - to achieve fame and recognition - has collapsed, the hero is overcome by strong emotional experiences.

Having recovered, he decides not to fight anymore, but to devote himself to his family. Unfortunately, this did not happen.

Another shock

The next blow for Andrei Bolkonsky was the death during childbirth of his wife Elizabeth. If it were not for the meeting with his friend Pierre Bezukhov, who tried to convince him that life is not over, and he needs to fight, despite the trials, it would have been much more difficult for the hero to survive such grief. “I live and this is not my fault, therefore, I need to live until death somehow better, without interfering with anyone,” he lamented, sharing his experiences with Pierre.


But, thanks to the sincere support of a comrade, who convinced his friend that “you have to live, you have to love, you have to believe,” the hero of the novel survived. During this difficult period, Andrei not only gained courage in his soul, but also met his long-awaited love.

For the first time, Natasha and Andrei meet at the Rostov estate, where the prince comes to spend the night. Disappointed in life, Bolkonsky understands that finally the happiness of true and bright love has smiled on him.

A pure and purposeful girl opened his eyes to the fact that he needs to live for the people, do good for those around him. A new, hitherto unknown to him, feeling of love flared up in Andrei’s heart, which Natasha shared.


They got engaged, and maybe would have become a wonderful couple. But circumstances intervened again. A fleeting hobby appeared in the life of Andrei’s beloved, which led to disastrous consequences. It seemed to her that she had fallen in love with Anatoly Kuragin, and although the girl later repented of her betrayal, Andrei could no longer forgive her and treat her the same way. “Of all the people, I have never loved or hated anyone more than her,” he admitted to his friend Pierre. The engagement was called off.

Death of Andrei in the War of 1812

Going to the next war, Prince Bolknonsky no longer pursues ambitious plans. His main goal is to protect his homeland and his people from the attacking enemy. Now Andrei is fighting next to ordinary people, soldiers and officers, and does not consider this shameful. “...He was entirely devoted to the affairs of his regiment, he was caring for his people and officers and affectionate with them. In the regiment they called him our prince, they were proud of him and loved him...” writes Leo Tolstoy, characterizing his favorite hero.

The wound in the Battle of Borodino was fatal for Prince Andrei.

Already in the hospital, he meets with ex-lover Natasha Rostova, and feelings between them flare up with renewed vigor. “...Natasha, I love you too much. More than anything else…” he admits.

However, this revived love does not stand a chance, because Bolkonsky is dying. The devoted girl spends the last days of Andrei's life next to him.

He not only knew that he would die, but he felt that he was dying, that he was already half dead. He experienced a consciousness of alienation from everything earthly and a joyful and strange lightness of being. He, without haste and without worry, awaited what lay ahead of him. That formidable, eternal, unknown, distant, the presence of which he never ceased to feel throughout his entire life, was now close to him and - due to the strange lightness of being that he experienced - almost understandable and felt...”

This is how the earthly life of Andrei Bolkonsky ended sadly. He experienced many sorrows and troubles, but the path to eternity opened ahead.

If it weren't for the war...

Every thoughtful reader can conclude: how much grief and misfortune the war brought to humanity. After all, if not for the mortal wound that Andrei received on the battlefield, perhaps their love with Natasha Rostova would have had a happy continuation. After all, they loved each other so much and could symbolize the ideal family relations. But, alas, man does not spare his own kind and absurd confrontations claim many lives of people who, if they remained alive, could bring considerable benefit to the Fatherland.

It is this idea that runs through the entire work of Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy.

Andrei Bolkonsky is the son of a rich, noble, respected nobleman of the Catherine era. Andrey is the most educated person of his time. Well-mannered, smart, decent, honest, proud. Strong-willed, reserved and practical. Strongly developed sense of self-esteem. At the beginning of the novel, married to a little princess, he feels unhappy, treats secular society with contempt and admits to Pierre that such a life is not for him. He loves work, strives for useful activity and cannot be satisfied with that brilliant, idle, but empty life with which the people of his circle are completely satisfied. To change his lifestyle, he goes to war - he is attracted by military glory. His hero is Napoleon, and he wants to conquer his Toulon. He is captivated by the activities of the headquarters, where Kutuzov himself notices in him the outlook of a statesman. Andrei Bolkonsky is on the battlefield during the Battle of Shengrabin. On the Field of Austerlitz he performs a heroic act. Seriously wounded, he looks into the bottomless sky, which seems to speak of the worthlessness of his desires. Andrey is disappointed. On the battlefield, he saw his idol, who seemed to him a small and insignificant man in a gray frock coat, admiring the many dead. Bolkonsky took this disappointment hard. Having recovered from injury and having lost his wife, who died in childbirth, he decides to live only for himself and no longer serve. He gives his strength to those close to him. He is engaged in the improvement of his estate. Having released 300 serfs, he replaced the rest with quitrent. To help the women, he sent a learned grandmother to Bogucharovo and instructed the priest to teach peasant children for a salary. He read a lot and worked on drawing up a new military manual. But all this did not absorb his strength. His gaze was dead and extinct. He became convinced of the futility of his activities under the existing regime when he met with Arakcheev and Speransky.

Influenced by a trip to Otradnoye and a meeting with Natasha Rostova, Andrei Bolkonsky returns to active life, realizing that at 30 it doesn’t end yet. He discovers a different perception of life in his love for Natasha Rostova. Communication with her awakens the best feelings in the hero. After Natasha's betrayal, his love for her did not fade until the end of his life, when he understood Natasha's suffering and forgave her. The ability for deep feeling complements his inner wealth, his spiritual beauty. When did it start Patriotic War In 1812, Prince Andrey without hesitation joined the army, where he began to command a regiment. Personal glory no longer attracted him. He understood that as a nobleman who loves his homeland, he must be where it is difficult, where he is most useful.

The path of Andrei Bolkonsky is the path to the people, the path to selfless service to the homeland. Bolkonsky belonged to that advanced part of the nobility from whose midst the Decembrists emerged.

The image of Andrei Bolkonsky in the novel "War and Peace" (2nd version)

The greatest work of the Russian writer - L. N. Tolstoy’s novel “War and Peace” - illuminates important aspects folk life, views, ideals, life and morals of various strata of society in peacetime and in the difficult days of war. The author stigmatizes high society and treats the Russian people with warmth and pride throughout the entire narrative. But the high society, which unites all the nobility, has its heroes. Tolstoy contrasts the Bolkonsky and Rostov families with those who are deeply indifferent to the fate of their homeland. Unusual, bright and short life Prince Andrei Bolkonsky is filled with permanent moral quests, the desire to know the meaning of life, to goodness and truth. At our first acquaintance with Prince Andrei, we see in him a restless person, dissatisfied with his real life. Wanting to be useful to the Fatherland, dreaming of military career, Prince Bolkonsky leaves for military service in 1805. At this time, he is passionate about the fate of Bonaparte.
Bolkonsky begins his military service from the lower ranks among the adjutants at Kutuzov’s headquarters and, unlike staff officers such as Drubetskoy, is not looking for an easy career and awards. Prince Andrei is a patriot by nature, he feels responsible for the fate of the Fatherland, for the fate of the Russian army, and considers it necessary to be where it is especially difficult, where the fate of what is dear to him is being decided.
Among the main questions that concern Tolstoy are: true patriotism and the heroism of the Russian people. In the novel, Tolstoy talks a lot about the faithful sons of the Fatherland, ready to give their lives to save their homeland. One of them is Prince Andrei Bolkonsky: “Having seen Mak and heard the details of his death, he realized that half of the campaign was lost, understood the difficulty of the position of the Russian troops and vividly imagined what awaited the army and the role that he would have to play in it "
Prince Andrei insists that he be sent to Bagration’s detachment, which was tasked with detaining the enemy and not allowing him to cut off “the route of communication with the troops coming from Russia.” Kutuzov’s words: “If one tenth of his detachment comes tomorrow, I will thank God” did not stop Bolkonsky. “That’s why I ask you to send me to this detachment,” he answered.
The birth of a child and at the same time the death of his wife, before whom he felt guilty, in my opinion, aggravated, so to speak, Bolkonsky’s spiritual crisis. It seems to him that his life is over. He was disappointed in everything: “I live and it’s not my fault, therefore, I need to live until death somehow better, without interfering with anyone,” says Prince Andrei to Pierre. And, in my opinion, it was under the influence of Pierre that the spiritual revival of Prince Andrei began: “... for the first time after Austerlitz he saw that high, eternal sky... and something that had long fallen asleep, something better that was in silently, suddenly joyful and youthful awakened in his soul.” And the meeting with Natasha Rostova in Otradnoye finally awakens him to life. Love for the cheerful, poetic Natasha gives birth in Andrey’s soul to dreams of family happiness. Natasha became the second for him, new life. She had something that the prince did not have, and she harmoniously complemented him.
After Natasha’s confession, Andrei’s ardor subsides. Now he feels responsible for Natasha, he wants this, and at the same time he is afraid. After listening to his father, Andrei postpones the wedding for a year. Natasha and Andrey are very different people. She is young, inexperienced, trusting and spontaneous. He already has a whole life behind him, the death of his wife, his son, the trials of difficult wartime, a meeting with death. Therefore, Andrei cannot fully understand the essence of a young girl who has absolutely no life experience. Natasha lives by feelings, Andrey lives by reason.
And again Andrey suffers deep disappointment. In his absence, Natasha cannot live in peace, she needs movement, feelings, a change of scenery, new events, new acquaintances, and she finds herself in a world inhabited by Helen, Anatole, and Prince Vasily - cynical, cold representatives of high society. Natasha cannot resist the seducer - Anatole.
All dreams of a family collapsed in Andrei’s soul: “That endless receding vault of the sky that stood above him before suddenly turned into a low vault that definitely pressed on him, in which everything was clear, but there was nothing eternal and mysterious.” And Prince Andrei again returns to his element - to the army. There he must think, first of all, not about himself, but about the interests of his Fatherland, about the lives of his soldiers. Bolkonsky “... was entirely devoted to the affairs of his regiment. He was caring for his men and officers and affectionate with them. The regiment called him “our prince.” They were proud of him and loved him.”
On the eve of the Battle of Borodino, Prince Andrei was filled with firm confidence that the Russian army would win the upcoming battle. He believed in the people, his soldiers, in the rightness of the fight for the Fatherland. Andrey walked on the grass, admired the beauty native land, looked at flowers, earth, leaves, grass. And in this peaceful and calm moment he receives a mortal wound. Enduring severe suffering, realizing that he is dying, before the mystery of death he experiences a feeling of universal love and forgiveness. At this tragic moment, another meeting of Prince Andrei and Natasha takes place. War and suffering made Natasha an adult, now she understands how cruelly she treated Bolkonsky, betrayed such a wonderful person because of her childhood passion. Natasha is on her knees asking the prince for forgiveness. And he forgives her, he loves her again. He already loves with unearthly love, and this love brightens him up last days in this world. Dying, Bolkonsky unites with eternity. He always strived for this, but could not connect the heavenly and earthly. Prince Andrei managed to do this by gaining faith.

The image of Andrei Bolkonsky in the novel "War and Peace" (version 3)

Introducing readers to Andrei Bolkonsky, Tolstoy paints a portrait of his hero. Prince Andrei Bolkonsky was small in stature, a very handsome young man with definite and dry features. In Scherer's salon, where we first meet him, he has a tired, bored look, often "a grimace spoils his handsome face." But when Pierre approached him, Bolkonsky “smiled with an unexpectedly kind and pleasant smile.”

When talking with Pierre, “his dry face kept trembling with the nervous revival of every muscle; the eyes, in which the fire of life had previously seemed extinguished, now shone with a radiant bright shine.” And so everywhere and always: dry, proud and cold with everyone who is unpleasant to him (and he is unpleasant with careerists, soulless egoists, bureaucrats, mental and moral nonentities), Prince Andrei is kind, simple, sincere, frank, with simple faces, alien to any falsehood and lies. He respects and appreciates those in whom he sees serious inner content.

Prince Andrey is a richly gifted person. He has an extraordinary mind, distinguished by a penchant for serious, deep work of thought and introspection; At the same time, he is completely alien to daydreaming and the “foggy philosophizing” associated with it. However, this is not a dry, rational person. He has a rich spiritual life, deep feelings. Prince Andrei is a man of strong will, an active, creative nature, he strives for a broad social and government activities. This need is supported in him by his inherent ambition, the desire for fame and power. It should be said, however, that Prince Andrei is incapable of bargaining with his conscience. He is honest, and his desire for glory is combined with a thirst for selfless achievement.

A complex and deep nature, Prince Andrei lives in a period of social excitement that gripped the educated circles of the nobility during the Patriotic War, in the atmosphere in which the future Decembrists were formed. In such an environment, the deep, sober mind of Prince Andrei, enriched with a variety of knowledge, critical of the surrounding reality, seeks the meaning of life in activities that would bring him moral satisfaction.

The war awakened ambition in him. Napoleon’s dizzying career makes him dream of his “Toulon,” but he thinks of winning it not by avoiding dangers at headquarters, but in battle, with his courage. This is what Prince Andrei does at Austerlitz. But after being seriously wounded at Austerlitz, he experiences a sharp mental reaction: he becomes convinced of the pettiness of his ambitious goals.

Under the influence of everything he experienced in the war, Prince Andrei falls into a gloomy, depressed mood and experiences a severe mental crisis. In a conversation with Pierre, who visited him in Bogu-charov at this time, he, irritable and nervous, develops in front of his interlocutor a theory of life that is completely unusual for him. “Living for yourself, now avoiding these two evils (remorse and illness) - that’s all my wisdom now.” But Pierre does not believe this “wisdom” - and rightly so: all the qualities of Prince Andrei and his life practice (measures to improve the life of the peasants, their partial liberation) contradict this.

The meeting with Natasha in Otradnoye revived Prince Andrei. He developed a need for broad government activities. He goes to St. Petersburg and meets here with the most prominent figure of the era - Speransky. But soon the nature of Speransky, a man of a cold mind, repels him. He felt the falseness in Speransky - and his illusions about the possibility of fruitful activity among the bureaucrats and court parties dissipated. He experiences disappointment again.

Prince Andrei has a great will to life, and to life specifically with people: “It is necessary that life should not be for me alone, so that it is reflected on everyone and that everyone lives with me.”

The danger looming over the country transformed Prince Andrei. The patriotism of Prince Andrei is clearly formulated in his words spoken to Borodin the day before: “The French have ruined my house and are going to ruin Moscow, they have insulted and are insulting me every minute. And Timokhin and the entire army think so. We must execute them."

The path of Prince Andrei is the path of gradual rapprochement with the people. He sees his main purpose in serving the people. Prince Andrei takes care of his peasants: he lists several hundred of his serfs as “free cultivators” (that is, he sets them free, giving them land), for others he replaces corvee with quitrent, etc.

When the Patriotic War began, Prince Andrei voluntarily joined the army. He refuses to serve on the staff of the “person of the sovereign.” He is convinced that only service in the active army will give him the confidence that he will be useful in the war. Having received command of the regiment, Prince Andrei becomes even closer to the people. “In the regiment they called him our prince, they were proud of him and loved him.” Thus, ordinary Russian soldiers played the main role in the spiritual renewal of Prince Andrei.

A serious wound received on the Borodino field interrupts the activities of Prince Andrei. But his inquisitive thoughts continue to work during his illness. Lying at the dressing station, he sums up his life's journey.

Prince Andrei passionately wants to live, and at the same time he thinks: “But isn’t it all the same now?.. And what will happen there (that is, after death.) and what was there? Why did I feel sorry to part with my life? There was something in this life that I did not understand and do not understand.”

And in these moments, a fiery thought dawns on him about the enormous, universal, all-forgiving love for people that he would have brought if he had remained alive.

But Prince Andrey was not destined to recover from his wound. In Yaroslavl, where the Rostovs transported him, he realized that he was dying. In semi-delirium, in hours of suffering solitude, he painfully thinks about what eternal love is, and comes to the realization that it requires renunciation of life: “To love everyone, to always sacrifice oneself for love meant not to love anyone, it meant not to live this earthly life." This was a clear sign of a mental breakdown.

However, when Natasha was next to him again, Prince Andrei again returned to the thought of life and earthly love. “Everything that exists, everything exists only because I love,” he reasons. Thus, two contradictory statements struggle in his soul: love is life and love is death.

The second one wins. “His soul was not in a normal state,” explains the author. Prince Andrei ultimately comes to an idealistic understanding of love and death: “Love is God, and to die means for me, a particle of love, to return to a common and eternal source.” He himself understood that there was something missing in these thoughts, that in them “there was something one-sided, personal, mental - there was no obviousness.”

Shortly before his death, he had a difficult dream. In a dream, he again fights for life, experiencing a painful fear of death. But death wins even in a dream, and Prince Andrei wakes up with the thought that death is liberation. With this thought he dies.

His dying thoughts are the thoughts of a man broken by illness and suffering, unusual for the sober mind of Prince Andrei. The spiritual appearance of Prince Andrei is characterized not by these dying reflections, colored by mysticism, but by his inquisitive, sober, materialistic mind, his desire for social activity, his love for the people, the struggle for whose happiness he would have devoted his life if he had not died from a wound. Death cut short his quest.

The spiritual appearance of Prince Andrei and all his activities give the right to assume that if he had remained alive, his quest would have led him to the camp of the Decembrists.

Prince Andrei Bolkonsky is one of the main characters of the novel by L.N. Tolstoy "War and Peace". With the help of this hero, the author tried to convey the course of life, aspirations and searches of the advanced nobility of the first third of the 19th century. Andrey is a complex image: next to many positive qualities there is something in it that makes the reader think about whether the prince is right in the current situation and what his fate will be in the future.

We first meet the prince in the first chapter of the novel: he appears in the salon of Anna Pavlovna Scherer along with his wife Lisa. He stands out clearly from all the elite gathered in the house that evening. Firstly, he is a military man and would soon be going to war, but he is not interested in the vibrant debate about Napoleon going on around him. He is strict and straightforward, and this literally pushes away society ladies and gentlemen who are accustomed to “putting on smiles.” From his every gesture, movement, and action, it becomes clear that he feels like a stranger in the salon, he is uncomfortable here. He came here only because of the requests of his pregnant wife, the complete opposite of him, who loved such evenings. To refuse to accompany her would be a tactless act, contrary to the moral standards of that time. One gets the impression that he is ready to go to war not because he longs to defeat Napoleon, but because he is tired of his wife, whom he does not love, and tired of the secular society that surrounds them. He is looking for something new, wants a new perception of himself, he dreams of glory. Andrei does not go to war according to his inner convictions.

Prince Andrei is a secretive person, his soul is closed even to his closest people. On his father’s estate, where he brought his expecting wife before going to war, he behaves like an empty person devoid of any inner warmth. Despite the fact that it is difficult for him to part with his family, he carefully hides it, adopting a “calm and impenetrable expression on his face.” Probably, if precisely at these moments he had given at least a little tenderness to his wife, he would not have been tormented later by remorse. And he even makes fun of his sister when talking about his father, although he knows what a complex character he has and in what harsh conditions she has to live. But only Princess Marya can persuade his brother to obey her: the prince does not believe in God, but puts on his neck the icon she gave him, which all their ancestors wore.

Andrey is very similar to his father. This becomes clear from the scene of their farewell: they have the same opinion, they are both highly intelligent. Without even asking a word about family life son, he understands all Andrei’s feelings and thoughts towards his wife.

The war brings nothing but disappointments to the prince: injury, the death of Lisa, and most importantly, the awareness of the war as a meaningless bloody act, and Napoleon as a small and insignificant person. The hero has a desire to change what surrounds him.
He is a purposeful person and soon after returning from the war, Andrei manages to make changes on the family estate, for example, introducing literacy training for peasants and courtyard children. These activities became the threshold of a new life for the prince.
Natasha Rostova becomes a salvation for Andrey, she seems to wake him up from eternal sleep. On the one hand, she is lively, ebullient, always unexpected - the opposite of Andrei. But on the other hand, she is a patriot, she loves the Russian people, their songs, traditions, rituals - and this is why she is close to the nature of the prince.

Andrei dies from a serious wound. In his moments of death throes, he remembers his childhood and family. He understands that the main thing in a person’s life is love and forgiveness, what Princess Marya asked him for and what he did not realize then. Andrey truly appreciated life only when he was on the edge.

In a novel, one of the most important ways to correctly understand the character of the characters, their feelings and experiences is the description of dreams. In the prince's dream, which appeared to him shortly before his death, all the contradictions that were insoluble for him are revealed.
Andrei leaves this life calm and spiritual, because even Natasha and Princess Marya cry not because they understand the loss of a loved one, since they were ready for this. They cry because they understand the solemnity of this death.

The name of Andrei Bolkonsky is known even to those who have never read the novel. It is always associated with something proud, but truthful, alive and worthy. Such glory was given to the hero by a reliable and psychologically clear description of the prince. Tolstoy was not afraid to show one of his favorite heroes in moments of joy, and in moments of grief, and in moments of triumph, and in moments of defeat - and thus won.

“He is too good to live” - these are the words of the heroine of the novel by L.N. Tolstoy's "War and Peace" Natasha Rostova spoke about her fiancé, Prince Andrei Bolkonsky. Are these words true regarding of this hero?
Andrei Bolkonsky - “a short, very handsome young man with definite and dry features” - admires Pierre Bezukhov with his reading and erudition. His judgments and questions are striking in the precision and definiteness of his formulations, and his relationships with people are clear and unambiguous. In addition, in the world, all doors and horizons are open to Prince Andrei - he “could easily be an aide-de-camp.”
But Bolkonsky dreams of more - he is bored with the world with its emptiness and mediocrity. The hero craves fame, honor and admiration equal to that of Napoleon himself - it is not for nothing that this French commander is his idol at the beginning of the novel.
Thus, we see that Prince Andrei is selfish, very vain and ambitious. Everything in Bolkonsky’s life is subordinated to one goal; in everything he is guided by his brilliant, cold mind, paying little attention to his soul and feelings.
Once at the front, Bolkonsky was respected by soldiers and officers: “Prince Andrei was one of those rare officers at the headquarters who believed his main interest was in the general course of military affairs.” But it is here that the hero will have to part with his former ideals.
In the Battle of Austerlitz, the author gives Bolkonsky the opportunity to make his dream come true. It is here that Prince Andrei finally comes to the conviction that his “Toulon” is coming. All the hero’s reflections on the eve of the battle end with one thought: “And yet I love and value only the triumph over all of them...”
It falls to Prince Andrey to become the “savior of the army”, to turn back the shamefully fleeing “Russian army”. It is he who picks up the banner and, wounded, falls, and the battalion he returned goes forward.
But from this moment it begins new era in Bolkonsky’s life: the bustle of war disappears somewhere - it is replaced by complete, unbroken silence. Wounded, Prince Andrei sees “the sky” for the first time - “immeasurably high, with gray clouds quietly creeping across it.” “Heaven” here symbolizes eternal, endless life, which the war tried to interrupt, but retreated ingloriously, having been defeated by life.
The unexpected appearance of Napoleon, a recent idol, on the battlefield now gives rise to an unpleasant, hostile feeling in Bolkonsky, combined with repentance. Everything experienced in reality and in dreams, in the past, present and future, merges into a single image of the world, as Prince Andrei now sees it: “A quiet life and calm family happiness in Bald Mountains seemed to him.”
Bolkonsky returns home from captivity, inspired by the belief that it is possible to correct what he has done by surrendering to the life that “heaven” symbolized. But the death of his wife following the birth of his son; the fact that she “wasn’t surprised that he came... didn’t understand that he came” shakes Bolkonsky’s soul. He again withdraws into himself, in his repentance. Living with his father, sister and son, the hero takes care of household chores, but this does not bring him true happiness.
This continued until the meeting with Bezukhov, who convinced Bolkonsky that “we must live, we must love, we must believe... that we do not live now only on this piece of land, but have lived and will live forever there, in everything...”. With these words, Prince Andrey again regains the feeling of his involvement in endless life. For the first time since Austerlitz, Bolkonsky sees “heaven” and with all his soul rushes towards life, which promises him unknown, immense possibilities. It was at this time that Natasha met on Prince Andrei’s path, striking him with the originality of her “separate... cheerful and happy life.”
The St. Petersburg period of Bolkonsky’s life, which followed, is marked by intense work of consciousness and at the same time closeness to the natural sources of existence. The efforts of Prince Andrei are aimed at useful social activities under the leadership of a prominent figure of the era, M. M. Speransky.
However, disappointment soon sets in both with the figure of Speransky and with all his transformative activities. Prince Andrey thinks with irony about how he could be carried away by form instead of essence: to participate in the work of committees where they avoided talking about business; to believe that Speransky, who despises people, really cares about the good of humanity.
Following this disappointment comes another - crushing one: Natasha's betrayal and the dishonor of Bolkonsky associated with it. The hero again withdraws into himself, into his insulted dignity and desecrated ideal of love and happiness.
And only the war of 1812 “pulls” Bolkonsky out of this state, makes him forget about the personal for the sake of the general. At first, having got to the front, Prince Andrei seeks revenge on his offender Kuragin, but in the conditions of the Patriotic War he forgets about personal feelings: recognizing the wounded Anatol, who was next to him at the dressing station, Bolkonsky opens with emotion that they are connected by much more than what in the recent past made them enemies.
It is important that in this war, Prince Andrei is not looking for glory - he commands a regiment, and “the structure of the regiment, the well-being of its people, the need to receive and give orders occupied him.”
To finally get rid of the burden " outer man", Bolkonsky is helped from empty and false ideals by the proximity of death, which leaves him alone with the primary, main questions. The Patriotic War and the suffering he experienced along with everyone else enrich the hero with “pity and love” for everyone, prompting him not only to “forgive” Natasha, but also to love her with a new, more spiritual love.
Faced with a choice: stop there forever or return to ordinary life with its countless, not always sublime properties, Prince Andrei (who always dreamed of the embodiment of the ideal) chooses the first, that is, death.
Thus, this hero remains faithful to the desire to “be quite good” to the end. Having chosen death, he chose new stage spiritual development, a new step towards self-improvement. In this sense, in my opinion, Natasha Rostova’s words about him are true.
In any case, death was the logical ending to the life of this hero. I think he fulfilled his earthly destiny, walked his earthly path to the end. Prince Andrei is probably destined to understand and fully accept the truth (as Tolstoy interpreted it) only in another life.

He managed not only to diversify the literary world with a new work that is original from the point of view of genre composition, but also came up with bright and colorful characters. Of course, not all are regulars bookstores have read the writer’s cumbersome novel from cover to cover, but most know who Andrei Bolkonsky and Andrei Bolkonsky are.

History of creation

In 1856, Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy began work on his immortal work. Then the master of words thought about creating a story that would tell readers about the Decembrist hero, forced to return back to the Russian Empire. The writer unwittingly moved the scene of the novel to 1825, but by that time the protagonist was a family-owned and mature man. When Lev Nikolaevich thought about the hero’s youth, this time involuntarily coincided with 1812.

1812 was not an easy year for the country. The Patriotic War began because Russian empire refused to support the continental blockade, which Napoleon saw as the main weapon against Great Britain. Tolstoy was inspired by those troubled times, and besides, his relatives participated in these historical events.

Therefore, in 1863, the writer began working on a novel that reflected the fate of the entire Russian people. In order not to be unfounded, Lev Nikolaevich relied on the scientific works of Alexander Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky, Modest Bogdanovich, Mikhail Shcherbinin and other memoirists and writers. They say that in order to find inspiration, the writer even visited the village of Borodino, where the army and the Russian commander-in-chief clashed.


Tolstoy worked tirelessly for seven years on his fundamental work, writing five thousand draft sheets and creating 550 characters. And this is not surprising, because the work is endowed with a philosophical character, which is shown through the prism of the life of the Russian people in an era of failures and defeats.

“How happy I am... that I will never write verbose rubbish like “War” again.”

No matter how critical Tolstoy was, the epic novel War and Peace, published in 1865 (the first excerpt appeared in the Russian Messenger magazine), was a widespread success among the public. Work Russian writer amazed both domestic and foreign critics, and the novel itself was recognized as the greatest epic work of new European literature.


Collage illustration for the novel “War and Peace”

The literary diaspora noted not only the exciting plot, which is intertwined in both “peaceful” and “war” times, but also the size of the fictional canvas. Despite the large number characters, Tolstoy tried to give each hero individual character traits.

Characteristics of Andrei Bolkonsky

Andrei Bolkonsky is the main character in Leo Tolstoy's novel War and Peace. It is known that many characters in this work have real prototype For example, the writer “created” Natasha Rostova from his wife Sofia Andreevna and her sister Tatyana Bers. But the image of Andrei Bolkonsky is collective. Among the possible prototypes, researchers name Nikolai Alekseevich Tuchkov, lieutenant general of the Russian army, as well as staff captain of the engineering troops Fyodor Ivanovich Tizenhausen.


It is noteworthy that the writer initially planned Andrei Bolkonsky as minor character, who subsequently received individual traits and became the main character of the work. In the first drafts of Lev Nikolayevich Bolkonsky was a secular young man, while in subsequent editions of the novel the prince appears before readers as a male intellectual with an analytical mind, who sets an example of courage and courage for fans of literature.

Moreover, readers can trace from start to finish the formation of the personality and the change in the character of the hero. Researchers classify Bolkonsky as one of the spiritual aristocracy: this young man is building a career, leading social life, but he cannot be indifferent to the problems of society.


Andrei Bolkonsky appears before readers as a handsome young man of small stature and with dry features. He hates secular hypocritical society, but comes to balls and other events for the sake of decency:

“He, apparently, not only knew everyone in the living room, but was so tired of them that he found it very boring to look at them and listen to them.”

Bolkonsky is indifferent to his wife Lisa, but when she dies, the young man blames himself for being cold to his wife and not paying her due attention. It is worth noting that Lev Nikolaevich, who knows how to identify man with nature, reveals the personality of Andrei Bolkonsky in the episode where the character sees a huge dilapidated oak tree on the edge of the road - this tree is symbolically internal state Prince Andrey.


Among other things, Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy endowed this hero with opposite qualities; he combines courage and cowardice: Bolkonsky participates in a bloody battle on the battlefield, but in the literal sense of the word he is running from an unsuccessful marriage and a failed life. The protagonist either loses the meaning of life, then again hopes for the best, building goals and means to achieve them.

Andrei Nikolaevich revered Napoleon, he also wanted to become famous and lead his army to victory, but fate made its own adjustments: the hero of the work was wounded in the head and taken to the hospital. Later, the prince realized that happiness does not lie in triumph and laurels of honor, but in children and family life. But, unfortunately, Bolkonsky is doomed to failure: not only the death of his wife awaits him, but also the betrayal of Natasha Rostova.

"War and Peace"

The action of the novel, which tells about friendship and betrayal, begins at a visit to Anna Pavlovna Scherer, where the entire high society of St. Petersburg gathers to discuss politics and Napoleon’s role in the war. Lev Nikolaevich personified this immoral and deceitful salon with “ Famusovsky society“, which was brilliantly described by Alexander Griboyedov in his work “Woe from Wit” (1825). It is in Anna Pavlovna’s salon that Andrei Nikolaevich appears before readers.

After dinner and idle talk, Andrei goes to the village to visit his father and leaves his pregnant wife Lisa at the family estate Bald Mountains in the care of his sister Marya. In 1805, Andrei Nikolaevich went to war against Napoleon, where he acted as Kutuzov’s adjutant. During the bloody battles, the hero was wounded in the head, after which he was taken to the hospital.


Upon returning home, Prince Andrei received unpleasant news: his wife Lisa died during childbirth. Bolkonsky plunged into depression. The young man was tormented by the fact that he treated his wife coldly and did not show her due respect. Then Prince Andrei fell in love again, which helped him get rid of his bad mood.

This time the chosen one young man became Natasha Rostova. Bolkonsky proposed marriage to the girl, but since his father was against such a misalliance, the marriage had to be postponed for a year. Natasha, who could not live alone, made a mistake and began an affair with a lover of wild life, Anatoly Kuragin.


The heroine sent Bolkonsky a letter of refusal. This turn of events wounded Andrei Nikolaevich, who dreams of challenging his opponent to a duel. To take your mind off unrequited love and emotional experiences, the prince began to work hard and devoted himself to service. In 1812, Bolkonsky took part in the war against Napoleon and was wounded in the stomach during the Battle of Borodino.

Meanwhile, the Rostov family moved to their Moscow estate, where the war participants are located. Among the wounded soldiers, Natasha Rostova saw Prince Andrei and realized that love had not faded in her heart. Unfortunately, Bolkonsky’s poor health was incompatible with life, so the prince died in the arms of the astonished Natasha and Princess Marya.

Film adaptations and actors

Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy’s novel has been filmed more than once by eminent directors: the work of the Russian writer has been adapted for avid film fans even in Hollywood. Indeed, the number of films based on this book cannot be counted on one hand, so we will list only a few films.

"War and Peace" (film, 1956)

In 1956, director King Vidor brought Leo Tolstoy's work to television screens. The film differs little from the original novel. No wonder the original script was 506 pages, which is five times the size of the average text. Filming took place in Italy, with some episodes filmed in Rome, Felonica and Pinerolo.


The brilliant cast includes recognized Hollywood stars. She played Natasha Rostova, Henry Fonda played Pierre Bezukhov, and Mel Ferrer played the role of Bolkonsky.

"War and Peace" (film, 1967)

Russian filmmakers have not lagged behind their foreign colleagues, who amaze viewers not only with the “picture”, but also with the scope of their budget. The director worked for six years on the highest-budget film in the history of Soviet cinema.


In the film, film fans see not only the plot and acting, but also the director’s know-how: Sergei Bondarchuk used panoramic battles, which were new for that time. The role of Andrei Bolkonsky went to the actor. Kira Golovko and others also played in the film.

"War and Peace" (TV series, 2007)

German director Robert Dornhelm also took up the film adaptation of the work of Leo Tolstoy, seasoning the film with original storylines. Moreover, Robert departed from the canons in terms of the appearance of the main characters, for example, Natasha Rostova () appears before the audience as a blonde with blue eyes.


The image of Andrei Bolkonsky went to the Italian actor Alessio Boni, who is remembered by film fans for the films “Robbery” (1993), “After the Storm” (1995), “” (2002) and other films.

"War and Peace" (TV series, 2016)

According to the publication " The Guardian» residents Foggy Albion they began to buy original manuscripts by Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy after this series, filmed by director Tom Harperm.


The six-part adaptation of the novel shows viewers love relationship, devoting virtually no time to military events. He played the role of Andrei Bolkonsky, sharing the set with and.

  • Lev Nikolaevich did not consider his cumbersome work finished and believed that the novel “War and Peace” should end with a different scene. However, the author never brought his idea to life.
  • In (1956), costume designers used more than one hundred thousand sets of military uniforms, costumes and wigs, which were made from original illustrations from the time of Napoleon Bonaparte.
  • The novel “War and Peace” traces the author’s philosophical views and pieces from his biography. The writer did not like Moscow society and had mental vices. When his wife did not fulfill all his whims, according to rumors, Lev Nikolaevich walked “to the left.” Therefore, it is not surprising that his characters, like any mortals, have negative traits.
  • King Vidor's film did not gain fame among the European public, but it gained unprecedented popularity in the Soviet Union.

Quotes

“The battle is won by the one who is determined to win it!”
“I remember,” Prince Andrei hastily answered, “I said that a fallen woman must be forgiven, but I did not say that I can forgive. I can't".
"Love? What is love? Love prevents death. Love is life. Everything, everything that I understand, I understand only because I love. Everything is, everything exists only because I love. Everything is connected by one thing. Love is God, and to die means for me, a particle of love, to return to the common and eternal source.”
“Let’s leave the dead to bury the dead, but while you’re alive, you must live and be happy.”
“There are only two sources of human vices: idleness and superstition, and there are only two virtues: activity and intelligence.”
“No, life is not over at 31, suddenly it’s finally over,” Prince Andrei certainly decided. - Not only do I know everything that is in me, it is necessary for everyone to know it: both Pierre and this girl who wanted to fly into the sky, it is necessary for everyone to know me, so that my life is not just for me. life, so that they don’t live so independently of my life, so that it is reflected on everyone, and so that they all live with me!”