Throwing Anna Under the Train

Leo Tolstoy’s “Anna Karenina” is considered a classic Russian novel that lays bare the inequities of Russian feudal society. But a contemporary critic takes a dim view. In a tongue-in-cheek critique, Todd Gitlin takes Tolstoy to task for what he sees as Tolstoy’s projection of his arrogant phallocentric fantasies into the eponymous female character.

Key Takeaways:

• A book that purports to describe the world from the point of view of a woman — even as actual women everywhere are, in practice, erased.
• The appropriated experience of a subordinate group, liquidating her actual experience to capitalize on your own privilege and exalt your own reputation.
• It is a wonder, in fact, that Sophia herself has not jumped under a train.

“Although your book is praised for laying bare the inequities of the Russian feudal system, a closer reading shows that you refuse to imagine any alternative to that system.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/13/books/review/throwing-anna-under-the-train.html?_r=0