This brilliant, culturally resonant fiction was written towards the end of Tolstoy's life, but the conflict it describes has obvious, ironic parallels with current affairs today. It is 1852 and Hadji Murat is one of the most feared mountain chiefs and the scourge of the Russian army. When he comes to surrender, the Russians are delighted. Or have they naively welcomed a double-agent into their midst? With its series of sardonic portraits - from the inscrutable Hadji Murat to the fat and bumbling Tsar - Tolstoy's story is an astute and incredibly witty commentary on the nature of political relations and states at war.
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'Had President Yeltsin read Tolstoy's Hadji Murat, he would have been less likely to have started the war with Chechnya.' -- Evgenii Evtushenko
'a chilling warning that echoes loud and clear down the years' -- The Guardian, 5 May 2003
'a chilling warning that echoes loud and clear down the years' -- The Guardian, 5 May 2003
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New English translation of a literary gem from Russian literature
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4 of 6 people found the following review helpful
By Ibrahim Ali
Format:Paperback
The back of the book claims that this book will teach you more about the Russian Chechnya conflict than any other book will. An emphatic boast, and one that is sadly not lived up to. However as with almost all Tolstoy books there is still the masterful story to contend with. The tale tells of a rebel fighter who defects to the Russians after falling out with the ruling Imam of Chechnya. However before he can act against his former leader he asks the Russians to procure the safety of his family. Unfortunately things don't go to plan and a clash of civilisations, Muslim versus Orthodox ensues and we see the tale spiral into a violent conclusion. For a story written over a hundred years ago the detailed knowledge of Islam is striking, made even more striking by the way it is (mis-)represented in much of today's literature. Even without the wonders of the Internet Tolstoy manages to produce an accurate representation of Islam and skilfully shows the many sides to the conflict. Unlike his more famous works Hadji Murat is brief and enlivened with some startling un-politically correct quotes, my favourite being "a women has as much sense in her head as there are hairs on an egg"
3 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
According to Frederik Stork (who is he btw?) this book will explain more on Chezenya than a thousand hours of CNN. It is one of the four praises on the back cover. Another one is by famous philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. Hadzji Moerat is a rebel, according to some, a hero, according to others. Which is exactly the point to me. A freedom fighter and a terrorist are no different, the only difference is how they are being percepted. If you think about it, it is true. I wonder if the US and their 'fight against terrorism' have thought about it.
Moerat fights for freedom of the Cheznyans, oppressed by the Russians. The era we talk about is 1850, though it could have easily been written a century and a half later. This is one of the reasons I love reading Tolstoj. His books are never dated. War and peace, his 1800-page masterpiece talks about Napoleon invading Russia. It could have been about any war. Tolstoj, one of the great Russian authors, has a strong sense of justice. He criticises the church, even though he is a Christian himself, he doesn't like the aristocracy, though isn't exactly working class himself, and he dislikes (in this book) the Russians, his country.
As an avid fan I have read quite a few books by Tolstoj. This is not my favourite. Not big enough, not deep enough, not compared to some of his classics. But that still means an extremely high level, that most authors will never reach.
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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Sublime
3 Nov 2004
By W. Chamberlain
- Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback
Harold Bloom, the renowned literary critic, regards it as the sublime in prose. It has even been praised by Wittgenstein. In this story, Tolstoy details the surrender by Hadji Murat, a Chechen rebel, to the Russians, and what follows from this. It is written with all the insightfulness into such a situation that you would expect from Tolstoy, and should be of interest to anyone interested in War and Peace (which it was written after), as well as having great contemporary relevance to the conflicts between the Chechens and the Russians. I can't recommend it highly enough.
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