20.5.2025 | Charmed by each character's indecision; it's difficult to really change. I think narrative mostly selects for the linear, related events and thoughts, but AK is very interior, and follows the winding turns through the characters' minds whether or not they end in action or change. Identifying with Levin's yearning for (his external observation of) the simplicity of the peasant; an exoticized idea he has of the simple life.
14.7.2025 | Levin in the city feels out of place, always busy but not doing anything of consequence. He feels awkward among the customs of city life but he is less outwardly irritable than he was at the beginning of the book. His opinions about art and science and his difficulty in expressing them to others verbally; seeing his ideas from inside we surely sympathize with him, and it seems clear the author does. It's nice to read about a sort of Prufrock type guy who feels out of place everywhere and isn't super excited by social norms but (contrary to the trope as I usually understand it) actually does have a place where he feels at home and worthwhile. Wendell Berry/Thoreau/homesteader behavior but it is working for him! This is truly a much better book than I anticipated. Sensitively written, attuned to the inner lives of all its characters in a way that feels really satisfying and emotionally cathartic but about small/everyday life things. I did not expect to