ABSTRACT
The intellectual climate in Russia at the turn of the twentieth century was marked by a panegyrization of youth and a cultural setting that disregarded the past and obsolete, including the country’s ageing population. The writer Lev Tolstoy, however, took the opposite approach: To him, senescence was the most valuable stage in a human existence, and he constructed an idealized version of old age based on archaizing hagiographic and stoic patterns, requiring withdrawal from the world and an introspective mode. This reclusive model, though, collided with the realities of own late life, and as this chapter reveals, his search for an ideal ageing was hampered by contradictions on different levels. A key topic addressed is the collision between Tolstoy’s notion of an ageless, translinguistic and unified self, and the multiple versions of his ageing self, manifested through his constantly changing self-analysis and self-portraits. Notwithstanding the many inconsistencies of the author’s later years, this chapter argues that the legacy of the old Tolstoy is an impressive one. In a period dominated by an increasing tabooing related to the elderly, he shattered demeaning stereotypes, demonstrating, inter alia, that the final phase of life can be a time of change, renewal and growth.
