Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) was a Russian novelist, essayist, short story writer, and playwright, regarded as a giant in world literature for his masterpieces War and Peace and Anna Karenina.
Born to an aristocratic family, Tolstoy abandoned his studies in law and Oriental languages to serve in the Russian army during the Crimean War. This experience would profoundly shape the remainder of his life. Tolstoy’s subsequent spiritual awakening led him to advocate for nonviolent resistance, a moral ideology that would inform much of his fiction as well as his existential memoir, A Confession. Between 1901 and 1910, Tolstoy was a multiple nominee for both the Nobel Prize in Literature and the Nobel Peace Prize.
Louise Maude (1855–1939) and Aylmer Maude (1858–1938) were the primary English translators of Leo Tolstoy’s work, including War and Peace, Anna Karenina, and dozens of Tolstoy’s stories. Hailing from Russia and England, respectively, Aylmer and Louise lived in Moscow for a number of years before settling permanently in England, where they devoted themselves to progressive causes in addition to translating and popularizing Tolstoy’s works.
