by Maria K.

Created on: September 18, 2011   Last Updated: September 19, 2011

Prince Andrew Bolkonski is an antithesis to Pierre Bezukhov. "War and Peace" not being a traditional narrative of the struggle between good and evil, but rather a study of human character under extraordinary circumstances, the Bolkonski-Bezukhov pairing is not a conventional one either. To begin with, the two are not enemies, but in fact close friends, and are both patriots of their country and essentially good men.

But where Pierre is gentle, pliant and forgiving, Andrew is stern, unyielding and intolerant. Where the former bends, the latter breaks, their differences illuminated most clearly through their personal lives and particularly through the love of the same woman - Countess Natalie (Natasha) Rostova.

Andrew's first marriage to Lise does not come across as a romantic affair, but rather one forged out of duty and need to produce an heir to one of the oldest most respectable families in Russia. Lise is a fearful compliant creature, stuck in an impossible situation with her husband off to war and the father-in-law who positively terrifies her. Here again, there is a contrast to Pierre's first marriage where he was the party to yield and obey while his wife Elaine was the one to rule and do as she pleased.

It takes a near-death experience for Bolkonski to finally glimpse beyond the ever-present honor and duty to his family and to his country and to conceive of the possibility of happiness for himself as a person, rather than a prince and a soldier. A realization most people would arrive at fairly naturally, for Andrew is a result of being left wounded and alone in an open field, where he ponders the destiny of his country and his own as he nearly bleeds to death before he is rescued, of all people, by the sworn enemy of his country - Napoleon Bonaparte himself.

Whereas his friend Pierre Bezukhov floats down the river of life, allowing things to simply happen and come about for him, Prince Bolkonski's critical events are invariably jarring, their impact often dramatic and extreme. Pierre's love for Natasha, for instance, grows gradually from knowing her as a little girl to following her through all the major stages of her life. Andrew's love is sudden and falls upon him akin to a lightning from a clear sky. At the same time, while for Bezukhov to love is to adore and elevate, to Bolkonski it is - in some respects - to rule and possess.

Even as a man passionately in love, he yields to his sense of duty to his father and agrees to postpone the marriage by

• 1
• 2
• Next Page >>