“I remember that straightway I was filled with such a profound sadness that I had a desire to weep, to weep over the loss forever of my innocence, of my relations with women.

Together with his brother, they went to a brothel with a group of friends. Pozdnyshev frankly shares his first sexual experience or, as he refers to it, the experience of “becoming a voluptuary”. Among people of his social circle, it is considered normal and even healthy for men to “indulge in debauchery” before marriage. Vicious circleĭiscussing sex education of boys and girls, Pozdnyshev notes with bitterness how morally corrupt the fashionable society is. Disappointment brings Pozdnyshev to hating his wife and feeling obsessively jealous,” writes Andrei Zorin in his book The Life of Leo Tolstoy. “Tolstoy was convinced that the misfortune that befell his characters’ family stemmed from their sexual promiscuity before marriage, which taught them to expect from family life, first of all, the satisfaction of carnal desires. In the epigraph to The Kreutzer Sonata, the author quotes from the Gospel: “I say to you that everyone looking upon a woman in order to lust after her already has committed adultery with her in his heart.” The book does not ever make it clear whether Pozdnyshev’s wife was unfaithful to him or not: Tolstoy is by far more preoccupied with feelings, rather than actions. Actors Mikhail Porechenkov as Pozdnyshev and Natalya Shvets as Liza appear in a scene from ‘The Kreutzer Sonata’ by Leo Tolstoy staged at the Chekhov Moscow Art Theatre.

The kreutzer sonata by leo tolstoy