7 Secrets of Anna Karenina

1. The Secret of Dolly’s Innocence

After Stiva’s infidelity scandal, Anna comes to the Oblonskys’ house to reconcile the couple. A distraught Dolly justifies her refusal to forgive her husband:

“‘Very well,’ she said suddenly. ‘But I will tell you first. You know how I was married. With Maman’s education, I was not only innocent, but I was stupid. I knew nothing. They say, I know, husbands tell their wives about their past life, but Stiva…’—she corrected herself—‘Stepan Arkadyich told me nothing. You won’t believe it, but I thought until now that I was the only woman he had ever known. So I lived for eight years. You must understand that I not only did not suspect infidelity, but I considered it impossible, and then, imagine, with such notions, suddenly to learn the whole horror, the whole nastiness…’”

Why was Darya Oblonskaya so naive, not only before marriage but also afterward? In that era, the sexual education of men and women differed greatly. In a traditional noble family of the first half of the 19th century, the subject of sexual relations was not raised by teachers, and certainly not by parents. The custom was to raise a “morally pure” person, so adolescent interest in sex was suppressed, especially for girls. Until marriage, they believed that the only possible form of love was platonic, learned from fiction. Many young women went to the altar without any idea of sex.

The situation was quite different for young men. They often received answers to many questions through practical means. Before the abolition of serfdom, a young man was often assigned a female serf; later, the duty of “sexual enlightenment” passed to the house servants. Fathers often took their sons to public houses at a young age. According to the “Sexual Census of Students” conducted in 1904, the first encounter with a woman for the majority of respondents (69%) took place between the ages of 14 and 17.

2. The Secret of Rome

After Vronsky’s horse breaks its back and falls with the rider, the astonished spectators repeat a phrase several times:

“All that’s missing is a circus with lions.“

Anna Karenina is not only a novel about love but also a sharp social commentary. Tolstoy believed: “Our civilization is also heading for its decline, just like ancient civilization…” While people were dying of hunger in Russian villages, various entertainment establishments flourished in the cities. Tolstoy repeatedly compares Russia of the second half of the 19th century to Rome during its decline. Karenin calls the Krasnoye Selo races a “cruel spectacle,” and Vronsky is presented as one of the last “gladiators.” Gladiator is also the name of the winning horse, and one female spectator says: “If I were a Roman, I wouldn’t miss a single circus.” Anna socializes with Sappho, a society lioness, and Vronsky attends “Athenian evenings.“

3. The Secret of the Bonnet over the Mill and Raised Collars

Upon returning to Russia from Italy, Vronsky and Anna stop in St. Petersburg. Alexei meets his cousin, Betsy Tverskaya, who makes a strange remark while discussing Anna’s impending divorce from Karenin:

“You haven’t told me when the divorce is. Granted, I have thrown my bonnet over the mill—but other raised collars will cold-shoulder you until you marry.“

“To throw one’s bonnet over the mill” (or “over the windmills”) is a calque of the French idiom jeter son bonnet (sa coiffe) par-dessus les moulins. Literally, it means to throw one’s headdress over the mills; figuratively, it means to “go to the bad” or “let go of one’s reputation.” Betsy, who was condemning Anna, was herself a “most depraved woman” who openly deceived her husband. This phrase perfectly characterizes her attitude toward the purity of family relations.

The other item of clothing Betsy mentions is the raised collar. She is apparently referring to the men of the St. Petersburg beau monde: unusually high, starched shirt collars came into fashion at the beginning of the century.

4. The Secret of the Mazurka

At the beginning of the novel, at the Moscow ball, Kitty eagerly awaits Vronsky’s invitation to dance the Mazurka:

“It seemed to her that everything must be decided in the Mazurka.“

By that time, Kitty had already danced with Vronsky twice: the waltz and the quadrille. Why did she want to dance the Mazurka with him so badly?

Despite the festive atmosphere, the ball had a strict routine. It began with a polonaise, followed by a waltz, usually four French quadrilles, and the climax was the Mazurka, after which the ball ended or paused for a long supper.

The Waltz was considered one of the most erotic dances: partners faced each other, and the gentleman held the lady by the waist (a gesture considered improper outside the dance floor).

The Quadrille was a proper, formal dance during which everyday matters and social events were discussed. Romantic conversations were inappropriate.

The Mazurka emphasized the gentlemen’s masculinity: loud heel strikes, sharp arm movements mimicking the pulling of reins, and the so-called pas boiteux (limping step), recalling wounds in battle. During one figure of the Mazurka, the partner knelt before the lady. Crucially, the Mazurka also demonstrated the ladies’ grace. The apotheosis of the female part was a fall into the cavalier’s arms, as if the lady yielded to his pressure and agreed to give him her heart. It is therefore not surprising that Kitty Shcherbatskaya placed such high hopes on the Mazurka.

5. The Secret of the Karenins’ Children

Anna is not ready for a divorce, and Vronsky asks Dolly for help. His main argument in favor of a divorce is their children:

“My daughter is legally not my daughter, but Karenin’s. I don’t want this deception!” he said with an energetic gesture of negation… “And tomorrow a son will be born, my son, and legally he is Karenin’s; he is the heir neither to my name nor to my fortune, and however happy we may be as a family and however many children we may have, there is no bond between me and them. They are Karenins.”

In 19th-century legislation, as today, there was a presumption of legitimacy, according to which a baby born to a couple in lawful wedlock (like Anna Karenina and her husband) was recorded as legitimate. The child was considered legitimate until proven otherwise through a special ecclesiastical or judicial procedure. That is why little Anya received the name of her “father by law.”

Karenin could have initiated proceedings to declare the child born to his wife illegitimate, but his chances of winning were slim. The only legal argument would have been his inability to meet with Anna Arkadyevna during the time the child was conceived (306 days under the laws of the time). Since the Karenins were living together, little Anya had no chance of becoming a Vronskaya. Vronsky’s only way to legitimize his daughter was through the Karenins’ divorce.

The sole grounds for a divorce between Anna and Alexei Alexandrovich was adultery: Russian legislation called this the “offense against the sanctity of marriage.” After Anna’s near-fatal illness, Karenin forgave her infidelity and agreed to a fictitious divorce, taking the blame for the adultery himself. This would have allowed Anna to preserve her reputation, later marry Vronsky, and give their daughter his surname (after adoption). However, Anna herself, and subsequently her husband, refused this solution.

If Anna were to take the blame, the birth of little Anya would be the result of a criminal relationship, and such children could not be legitimized or adopted. By confirming her infidelity in court, Anna would have condemned herself to perpetual celibacy (this was only abolished in May 1904), would not have been able to officially marry Vronsky, and their future children would be considered illegitimate and unable to bear their father’s name.

6. The Secret of Karenin’s Refusal to Duel

When Anna’s infidelity was revealed, Vronsky’s first thought was a duel:

“Again, as at the first moment upon the news of her break with her husband, Vronsky, reading the letter, involuntarily gave himself up to the natural impression produced in him by his relation to the insulted husband. Now, as he held his letter in his hands, he involuntarily imagined the challenge which he would probably find at home today or tomorrow, and the duel itself, during which, with the same cold and proud expression that was on his face now, he would stand and fire into the air under the shot of the insulted husband.”

Karenin also considered a duel. For him, it was almost the only way to escape the unpleasant situation with his reputation unsullied. According to the Duelling Code, a duel could “provide a decisive and final restoration of honour.”

However, the offended Karenin never proceeded with the duel. This was not only due to the fear of being killed. In Russia, a duel was a criminal offense, and participation would have meant the end of Alexei Alexandrovich’s successful civil service career, which was incredibly important to him. The second reason was religious. The Church treated duellists as murderers and suicides—they could not be buried in consecrated ground, receive last rites, confession, or communion. As a religious man, Karenin could not allow himself to duel.

7. The Secret of the Loo Table

Deciding to propose to Kitty again, Levin chooses an unusual method and writes his confession on a loo table:

“‘I have long wanted to ask you one thing.’ He looked straight into her gentle, though frightened eyes. ‘Please ask it.’ ‘Look,’ he said, and wrote the initial letters: k, v, m, o, e, n, m, b, z, l, e, n, i, t?”

It is known that Levin’s “energetic, strong, not handsome figure, his paradoxes, his inclination to revolt against generally accepted authorities, his sincerity… passion for farming, relations with the peasants, disillusionment with science, turn to faith… all this can be rightly attributed to Tolstoy himself.” One of the most romantic scenes in the novel is also taken directly from the author’s biography: Tolstoy proposed to the 17-year-old Sofya Behrs in exactly the same way.

The proposal took place in August 1862. Countess Tolstaya wrote in her memoirs that after the other guests left, Leo Nikolayevich, “animatedly talking, kept” the Behrs sisters from leaving. When his fiancée was already at the door, Tolstoy called out, “Sofya Andreyevna, wait a little!” He then cleaned a loo table, took chalk, and asked her to guess what he meant by the initial letters: “L. N. cleaned all the card notations with a brush, took the chalk and began to write. We were both very serious, but greatly agitated… I followed his large, red hand and felt that all my spiritual powers and abilities, all my attention, were energetically concentrated on that chalk, on the hand that held it. We were both silent.”

Sofya Andreyevna soon read: “V. m. i p. s. s. zh. n. m. m. s. i n. s. V. v. s. s. l. v. n. m. i v. s. L. Z. m. v. s. v. s. T.” which translated to: “Vasha molodost i potrebnost schastya slishkom zhivo napominayut mne moyu starost i nevozmozhnost schastya. V vasheĭ sem’e sushchestvuet lozhnyĭ vzglyad na menya i vashu sestru L. Zashchitite menya vy s vasheĭ sestroĭ Tanechkoĭ” (Your youth and need for happiness too vividly remind me of my old age and the impossibility of happiness. In your family, there is a false view of me and your sister L. Defend me, you and your sister T.). After this, she understood that “something serious, significant had happened between them that could no longer cease.”

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