Nominated as one of AmericaтАЩs best-loved novels by PBSтАЩs The Great American Read
Often called the greatest novel ever written, War and Peace is at once an epic of the Napoleonic Wars, a philosophical study, and a celebration of the Russian spirit. TolstoyтАЩs genius is seen clearly in the multitude of characters in this massive chronicleтАФall of them fully realized and equally memorable. Out of this complex narrative emerges a profound examination of the individualтАЩs place in the historical process, one that makes it clear why Thomas Mann praised Tolstoy for his Homeric powers and placed War and Peace in the same category as the Iliad: тАЬTo read him . . . is to find oneтАЩ s way home . . . to everything within us that is fundamental and sane.тАЭ