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Of course, no novel is a direct window on to life and, however much it might approach that realist ideal in War and Peace, we cannot take these observations as an accurate reflection of reality. To read the correspondence of the Volkonskys - of course not forgetting that they became the Bolkonskys of War and Peace - is to find a far more complex situation than that presented by Tolstoy. Sergei Volkonsky wrote in French but inserted Russian phrases when he mentioned daily life on the estate; or he wrote in Russian when he aimed to underline a vital point and emphasize his own sincerity. By inclination, particularly after 1812, he wrote mostly in Russian; and he was obliged to in his letters from Siberia after 1825 (for his censors only read Russian). But there were occasions when he wrote in French (even after 1825): for example, when he wrote in the subjunctive mode or used formal phrases and politesses; or in passages where, in contravention of the rules, he wanted to express his views on politics in a language the censors would not understand. Sometimes he used French to explain a concept for which there was no Russian word - 'diligence', 'duplicite' and 'discretion'.⁹⁸

In its customs and its daily habits the aristocracy was struggling to

become more 'Russian', too. The men of 1812 gave up feasts of haute cuisine for spartan Russian lunches, as they strived to simplify and Russianize their opulent lifestyle. Noblemen took peasant 'wives' with growing frequency and openness (what was good for a Sheremetev was also good for them) and there were even cases of noblewomen living with or marrying serfs." Even Arakcheev, the Minister of War who became so detested for his brutal regime in the army, kept an unofficial peasant wife by whom he had two sons who were educated in the Corps des Pages.¹⁰⁰ Native crafts were suddenly in vogue. Russian china with scenes from rural life was increasingly preferred to the classical designs of imported eighteenth-century porcelain. Karelian birch and other Russian woods, especially in the more rustic stylings of serf craftsmen, began to compete with the fine imported furniture of the classical palace, and even to displace it in those private living spaces where the nobleman relaxed. Count Alexander Osterman-Tolstoy, a military hero of 1812, was the owner of a magnificent mansion on the English Embankment in St Petersburg. The reception rooms had marble walls and mirrors with sumptuous decorations in the French Empire style, but after 1812 he had his bedroom lined with rough wooden logs to give it the appearance of a peasant hut.¹⁰¹

Recreations were going Russian, too. At balls in Petersburg, where European dances had always reigned supreme, it became the fashion to perform the pliaska and other Russian dances after 1812. Countess Orlova was renowned for these peasant dances, which she studied and performed at Moscow balls.¹⁰² But there were other noblewomen who, like Natasha Rostov, had somehow taken in the spirit of the dance, as if they had breathed it 'from the Russian air'. Princess Elena Golitsyn danced her first pliaska at a New Year's Ball in Petersburg in 1817. 'Nobody had taught me how to dance the pliaska. It was simply that I was a "Russian girl". I had grown up in the country, and when I heard the refrain of our village song, "The Maid Went to Fetch the Water", I could not stop myself from the opening hand movements of the dance.'¹⁰³

Rural recreations were another indication of this newfound Russian-ness. It was at this time that the dacha first emerged as a national institution, although the country or suburban summer house did not become a mass phenomenon until the final decades of the nineteenth

century (Chekhov's Cherry Orchard was famously cut down for dacha building land). The high aristocracy of Petersburg was renting dachas in the eighteenth century. Pavlovsk and Peterhof were their preferred resorts, where they could escape the city's heat and take in the fresh air of the pinewood forests or the sea. The Tsars had elaborate summer palaces with immense pleasure gardens in both of these resorts. During the early nineteenth century the dacha fashion spread to the minor gentry, who built more modest houses in the countryside.