For the record, I have started reading Anna Karenina at least 3 times. Because I'm a Russian nerd. Because it's one of those books I SHOULD read.(Note to self: finish Best Short Stories of Dostoyevsky.) Because we have an antiquated copy of it laying about the house. But as I explained to someone, "I always get to the part where Levin is going on about the serfs and Kitty is like, right there, and I get annoyed and lose interest."*
But this time was different. Maybe because I figured, hell, if I can finish Moby Dick, I can certainly finish Anna Karenina. Maybe because I'd since watched that amazing Tolstoy biographical movie with Christopher "Captain Von Trapp please be my boyfriend" Plummer. Maybe because I'm older and have lived a little more and the whole thing was way more meaningful.
Mostly it's because most recent film adaptation, directed by Joe Wright (Atonement, the abridged film adaption of Pride and Prejudice that I don't hate as much as I should) and staring Keira Knightey (who I'm also supposed to hate but don't) opens today in select theaters. (Which means it should be in this zip code when? Oh that's right, never.)
I haven't read any reviews. Mostly because I'm all but contractually obligated to see it, and I'd rather not know beforehand if it sucks. (And even if it does suck, it will at least be beautifully cinematographed/art directed/costumed and can in no way be as painful as the time I was forced to sit through Beverly Hills Chihuahua.)
But this blog post is supposed to be about the novel. So getting back to that... We have an edition that I'm thinking originated with my grandmother. Hardcover. Joseph Ruzicka Bookbinders Baltimore, M.D./Greensboro, N.C./Washington D.C. New York Charles Scribner's Sons 1922. Copyright 1899 By Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. Retired at some point from Martin Memorial Library, York, Pennsylvania. In other words, an edition that I'm not going to find on Goodreads.
And since my Goodreads is linked to my Facebook account, and I'm just pretentious enough to want all of my friends and "friends" to know that I'm reading Anna Karenina (and not Fifty Shades of Grey), this necessitated choosing an edition to use in its stead, one that closely mimicked it in page numbers so as to make my reading progress more accurate.
Movie Tie-In, Paperback, 976 pages
Penguin Classics Paperback, 838 pages
Modern Library Paperback, 938 pages
Hmmm... my hardcover edition has 657 pages.
To make a long story short, turns out I have a hard copy of Anna Karenina through the middle of part 5, and I finished THAT book this morning, just like I said I would. It has no credited translator, making it very likely that when I read the second half (downloaded as an ebook on my phone?) it will be a different translation.
But I will persevere. Kitty has a baby bump. To be continued.
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| At left: Levin and Kitty from a drawing by E. Boyd Smith. At right: This is what happens to Cello tape after 50+years. |
* For what it's worth, Anna Karenina takes place post-emancipation, so Levin (read: Tolstoy) is, in actuality, going on and on about the muzhik. Just so you know...
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