‘'All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

Anna Karenina is a documentation of a couple families from high society in Russia mid 1870. A tragic story about an unhappy life, bad marriages, infidelity, destructive thoughts, miscommunication and the will to transform, to grow and to harvest what you have sown. Sometimes literally.

How do you begin a review about such a multilayered novel with so many metaphors? The same way I started this intimidating classic, just do it. And I’m glad I did, as this book left a mark.

Yes, it’s old and because of it, some values are outdated, sexist and even racist at times. Not brushing that away, as old fashioned isn’t an excuse for that, this book was still quite impressive. It let me think about life and the messiness of it, how we live it, about morality, gender roles, about how are own thoughts corrupt ourselves and about what it means to have a happy life.

Besides that it has food for thought, it’s also utterly prosaic and wonderfully written. It might have a incredible slow pacing, especially when it describes farming, but even these parts deliver some terribly good images about slow living and being aware of your surroundings. It tells the tale that ordinary life might be boring but it might be the happiest.
Many call this a romantic book. Although it does revolve a lot about falling in love and finding someone to marry and hopefully grow old with that particular someone, it also criticizes our way of perceiving love or the way we fall in love with the idea of love.

All in all this book was overly tragic especially after I felt connected with these families and grew to love them, but I still enjoyed reading it.