War and Peace Society and Class Quotes

Pierre, having decided to obey his guide in all things, made for the little settee she had pointed out to him. As soon as Anna Mikhailovna disappeared, he noticed that the eyes of everyone in the room turned to him with something more than curiosity and sympathy. He noticed that they all exchanged whispers, indicating him with their eyes, as if with fear and even obsequiousness. He was being shown a respect no one had ever shown him before: a lady unknown to him, who had been talking with the clerical persons, got up from her place and offered him a seat; the adjutant picked up a glove Pierre had dropped and handed it to him; the doctors fell deferentially silent when he walked past them and stepped aside to make way for him. Pierre first wanted to sit somewhere else, so as not to inconvenience the lady, wanted to pick up the glove himself, and to bypass the doctors, who were not standing in his way; but he suddenly felt that that would be improper; he felt that that night he was the person responsible for performing some terrible rite which everyone expected, and that he therefore had to accept services from them all. He silently accepted the glove from the adjutant, sat down in the lady's place, putting his big hands on his symmetrically displayed knees in the naïve pose of an Egyptian statue, and decided to himself that this was precisely as it had to be and that that evening, so as not to lose his head and do something foolish, he ought not to act according to his own reasoning, but give himself up entirely to the will of those who were guiding him." (1.1.19.20)

Rostov, in his junker's uniform, rode up to the porch, nudged his horse around, swung his leg over him in a supple, youthful movement, stood in the stirrup as if not wishing to part with his horse, finally jumped down, and shouted for the orderly.

"Ah, Bondarenko, friend of my heart," he said to the hussar who came rushing for his horse. "Give him a cooling down, my friend," he said with that merry brotherly tenderness with which all fine young men treat everyone when they are happy.

"Yes, Your Excellency," the Ukrainian replied, merrily shaking his head.

"See that you give him a good cooling down!'' (1.2.4.2-5)

The gentlemen who frequented Bilibin, young, rich, and merry society people, constituted here, as in Vienna, a separate circle, which Bilibin, who was the head of it, called "ours"— les notres. This circle, made up almost exclusively of diplomats, clearly had its own high society interests, which had nothing in common with war and politics, interests in relations with certain women and in the administrative side of their service. These gentlemen received Prince Andrei into their circle with apparent eagerness, as "theirs" (an honor they accorded to few). Out of courtesy and as a subject for getting into conversation, he was asked several questions about the army and the battle, and the conversation again broke up into inconsequentially merry jokes and gossip. (1.2.11.2)

Boris clearly understood at that moment what he had foreseen earlier, namely, that in the army, besides the subordination and discipline that were written in the regulations and known to the regiment, and which he knew, there was another more essential subordination, which made this tightly-girded, purple-faced general wait deferentially while the captain, Prince Andrei, for his own pleasure, found it preferable to talk with the ensign Drubetskoy. Boris resolved more than ever to serve in the future according to this unwritten subordination, not the one written in the regulations. He now felt that, merely as the result of his having been recommended to Prince Andrei, he had at once become higher than the general, who, on other occasions, at the front, could annihilate an ensign of the guards like him. (1.3.9.6)

Where, how, and when had this young countess, educated by an emigree French governess, imbibed from the Russian air she breathed that spirit and obtained that manner which the pas de chale [the French shawl dance] would, one would have supposed, long ago have effaced? But the spirit and the movements were those inimitable and unteachable Russian ones that Uncle had expected of her. As soon as she had struck her pose, and smiled triumphantly, proudly, and with sly merriment, the fear that had at first seized Nicholas and the others that she might not do the right thing was at an end, and they were already admiring her.

She did the right thing with such precision, such complete precision, that Anisya Fedorovna, who had at once handed her the handkerchief she needed for the dance, had tears in her eyes, though she laughed as she watched this slim, graceful countess, reared in silks and velvets and so different from herself, who yet was able to understand all that was in Anisya and in Anisya's father and mother and aunt, and in every Russian man and woman. (2.4.7.46-47)

Since the year 1805 we had made peace and had again quarreled with Bonaparte and had made constitutions and unmade them again, but the salons of Anna Pavlovna and Helene remained just as they had been – the one seven and the other five years before. At Anna Pavlovna's they talked with perplexity of Bonaparte's successes just as before and saw in them and in the subservience shown to him by the European sovereigns a malicious conspiracy [...] And in Helene's salon [...] they talked with the same ecstasy in 1812 as in 1808 of the "great nation" and the "great man," and regretted our rupture with France, a rupture which, according to them, ought to be promptly terminated by peace. Of late, since the Emperor's return from the army, there had been some excitement in these conflicting salon circles and some demonstrations of hostility to one another, but each camp retained its own tendency. [...] Prince Vassily, who still occupied his former important posts, formed a connecting link between these two circles. He visited his "good friend Anna Pavlovna" as well as his daughter's "diplomatic salon," and often in his constant comings and goings between the two camps became confused and said at Helene's what he should have said at Anna Pavlovna's and vice versa. (3.2.6.1-3)

On the ninth of August Prince Vassily at Anna Pavlovna's again met the "man of great merit." The latter was very attentive to Anna Pavlovna because he wanted to be appointed director of one of the educational establishments for young ladies. [...]

"Well, have you heard the great news? Prince Kutuzov is field marshal! All dissensions are at an end! I am so glad, so delighted! At last we have a man!" said [Prince Vassily].

The "man of great merit," despite his desire to obtain the post of director, could not refrain from reminding Prince Vassily of his former opinion. Though this was impolite to Prince Vassily in Anna Pavlovna's drawing room, and also to Anna Pavlovna herself who had received the news with delight, he could not resist the temptation. [...] The "man of great merit," who was still a novice in court circles, wished to flatter Anna Pavlovna by defending her former position on this question [. . . but] Prince Vassily would not now yield Kutuzov to anyone; in his opinion Kutuzov was not only admirable himself, but was adored by everybody. [...]

"They even say," remarked the "man of great merit" who did not yet possess courtly tact, "that his Excellency made it an express condition that the sovereign himself should not be with the army."

As soon as he said this both Prince Vassily and Anna Pavlovna turned away from him and glanced sadly at one another with a sigh at his naïveté. (3.2.7.10-27)

The most cunning man could not have crept into her confidence more successfully, evoking memories of the best times of her youth and showing sympathy with them. Yet Pierre's cunning consisted simply in finding pleasure in drawing out the human qualities of the embittered, hard, and (in her own way) proud princess. [...] His servants too – Terenty and Vaska – in their own way noticed the change that had taken place in Pierre. They considered that he had become much "simpler." Terenty, when he had helped him undress and wished him good night, often lingered with his master's boots in his hands and clothes over his arm, to see whether he would not start a talk. And Pierre, noticing that Terenty wanted a chat, generally kept him there.

"Well, tell me . . . now, how did you get food?" he would ask.

And Terenty would begin talking of the destruction of Moscow, and of the old count, and would stand for a long time holding the clothes and talking, or sometimes listening to Pierre's stories, and then would go out into the hall with a pleasant sense of intimacy with his master and affection for him.

The doctor who attended Pierre and visited him every day, though he considered it his duty as a doctor to pose as a man whose every moment was of value to suffering humanity, would sit for hours with Pierre telling him his favorite anecdotes and his observations on the characters of his patients in general, and especially of the ladies.

"It's a pleasure to talk to a man like that; he is not like our provincials," he would say.

There were several prisoners from the French army in Orel, and the doctor brought one of them, a young Italian, to see Pierre.

This officer began visiting Pierre, and the princess used to make fun of the tenderness the Italian expressed for him. [...] Pierre had evoked the passionate affection of the Italian merely by evoking the best side of his nature and taking a pleasure in so doing. (4.4.13.4-15)