ABSTRACT
Confession is a very unsatisfying work insofar as Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy does not really "confess" except in the sense of expressing his guilt feelings and admitting to his periodically depressive state. Tolstoy does not even manage to decide whether God exists or not, much less fill us in on the smaller details of what he believes. In psychoanalytic terms, Philosopher Vladimir Soloviev represents Tolstoy's God as a sadist who demands masochistic compliance. Tolstoy's ideas about Christ would later hold somewhat less significance for him, but for the time being he sincerely admired and believed in Christ's teachings. Tolstoy's idea of Christian nonresistance is also intimately related to the holy foolishness widespread in the Russian religious culture of his day. Tolstoy's attraction to public moral masochism began early in life. Irina Paperno observes that "the diaries of Tolstoy's late years are written in view of approaching death.
