"The Young Tsar" (''"Нечаянно"'') is a short story by
Leo Tolstoy written in 1894. According to Tolstoy's diary, he recalled having titled it ''"The Dream of a Young Tsar"''. The introduction that prefaces the story is by
Aylmer Maude
Aylmer Maude (28 March 1858 – 25 August 1938) and Louise Maude (1855–1939) were English translators of Leo Tolstoy's works, and Aylmer Maude also wrote his friend Tolstoy's biography, ''The Life of Tolstoy''. After living many years in Russi ...
.
Publication
According to the journalist
Leo Pasvolsky
Leo Pasvolsky (August 22, 1893 – May 5, 1953) was a journalist, economist, state department official and special assistant to Secretary of State Cordell Hull. He was one of the United States government's main planners for the post World War II ...
, it was written shortly after the accession to the throne of
Nicholas II
Nicholas II or Nikolai II Alexandrovich Romanov; spelled in pre-revolutionary script. ( 186817 July 1918), known in the Russian Orthodox Church as Saint Nicholas the Passion-Bearer,. was the last Emperor of Russia, King of Congress Pola ...
, and though Tolstoy hoped it would be able to be printed, the censors prohibited it. When a collection of posthumous works of Tolstoy were being prepared after the writer's death, Nicholas II was asked again if it could be published, and he again refused. The work would only be published long after Tolstoy's death. Unlike many of Tolstoy's other works, this means that it wasn't until the 1910s when Russian literary critics could examine this work. Fortunately, it was available as early as 1907 in English-language countries where Tsarist censorship was powerless.
It was translated in 1912 by
Leo Weiner
Leo or Léo may refer to:
Acronyms
* Law enforcement officer
* Law enforcement organisation
* ''Louisville Eccentric Observer'', a free weekly newspaper in Louisville, Kentucky
* Michigan Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity
Arts an ...
. In 1913, it was republished by
Edith Smith Davis in a
Temperance movement paper. It is included in a 2009 collection by Bottletree Books called ''Leo Tolstoy's 20 Greatest Short Stories Annotated''.
See also
*
Bibliography of Leo Tolstoy
References
External links
* Original Text
*
''The Young Tsar'' from RevoltLib.com
*
from
Marxists.org
Marxists Internet Archive (also known as MIA or Marxists.org) is a non-profit online encyclopedia that hosts a multilingual library (created in 1990) of the works of communist, anarchist, and socialist writers, such as Karl Marx, Friedrich Enge ...
Short stories by Leo Tolstoy
1894 short stories
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