“During Nikolai’s brief visit, as usual in a house where there are children, he resorted to Prince Andrei’s little son when there was a moment of silence, stroking his head and asking if he wanted to be a hussar. He took the boy in his arms, began tossing him merrily, and turned to look at Princess Marya. Her tender, happy, and timid gaze followed the boy she loved in the arms of the man she loved.”
- Leo Tolstoy, from “War and Peace”
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Prince Andrei at Borodino
“Prince Andrei opened his eyes and for a long time could not understand what was happening around him. He remembered the meadow, the wormwood, the field, the black, spinning ball, and his passionate fit of love for life. Two steps away from him, talking loudly and attracting general attention to himself, stood a tall, handsome, black-haired sergeant, leaning on a branch, his head bandaged. He had bullet wounds in his head and leg. Around him, listen eagerly to his talk, gathered a crowd of wounded and stretcher bearers.
‘We just pounded him out of there, he dropped everything, we caught the king himself!’ the soldier shouted, looking around him, his black, inflamed eyes glittering. ‘if only the reservers had come just then, brothers, he wouldn’t even have left his name behind, it’s the truth I’m telling you…’
Prince Andrei, like everyone else around the narrator, looked at him with shining eyes and experienced a comforting feeling. ‘But does it make any difference now?’ he thought. ‘And what will be there, and what has there been here?' Why was I so sorry to part with life? There was something in this life that I didn’t and still don’t understand…’”
- Leo Tolstoy, from “War and Peace”
Natasha's Prayer
“Teach me what I’m to do, how I’m to set myself right forever, forever, how I’m to live my life!”
- Leo Tolstoy, from “War and Peace”
" 'Annette, for God's sake, don't refuse me,' the countess said,
suddenly, blushing, which was quite strange with her thin, dignified, and no longer young face, and taking the money from under the handkerchief.
Anna Mikhailovna instantly realized what it was about and bent forward so as to embrace the countess adroitly at the right moment.
‘This is for Boris from me, to have his uniform made…’
Anna Mikhailovna was already embracing her and weeping. The countess was also weeping. They wept because they were friends; and because they were kind; and because they, who had been friends since childhood, were concerned with such a mean subject—money; and because their youth was gone….But for both of them they were pleasant tears…”
- Tolstoy, from “War and Peace”