On The Utopian Land Reform Of Landowners In Tolstoy's Works

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy is the spokesman for the Russian eminent realist in the 19th century. Not only do his great works play an influential role in the liberation of Russia, but also in the development of art.In his literary creation and social experience ranging half a century, Tolstoy, a Russian nobleman landowner, went through everything bright and dark taking place in Russia at that time. He accepted the thoughts of enlightenment and viewpoints of liberalism reform, witnessing the ups and downs in Russian Capitalism Revolution. However, even all this didn't exert any influence on his world view and he finally stood on the side of peasants whose social status is totally opposite to his. He rested his focus on peasant's problems throughout his whole life, putting this into practice for the liberation of peasants in Russia. Being a explorer and land reformist , he based his creation upon peasant's movement and ,on the other hand assisted the development of it. The protagonists in Tolstoy's fictions practiced reforms on land to improve peasant's living conditions, such as Nekhludoff in the Morning of a Host, Bezukhov and Prince Andrew in War and Peace, Levin in Anna Karenina, and Nekhludoff in Resurrection. They attempted to better the relationship between landowners and peasants, united with peasants to reform the land system and finally attained that peasants cooperated. But it is still impossible to erase the opposition and class distinction between landowners and peasants by the generosity of few landlords. So all attempts fell into emptiness , which caused radical changes in his world view. The exploration of land reform is an significant factor in his evolution of philosophy. The failure caused by land reform plays a prompting and decisive role in his evolution of thoughts. Being a product of social conditions, the reform's failure stimulated his peculiar thoughts. His thoughts and ideas , which mirror the reality that Russian peasants expect to eliminate official churches , landlords and land tenure so as to establish a free and equal life for themselves, are the outcome of radical social reform in Russia.This thesis is trying to, from the perspective of history, in the Utopian land reform of his protagonists, generalize the fact how Tolstoy's world view is evolved so that a better comprehension of Tolstoy will be achieved.