


The first is the dilemma of a young man who desires both fulfilling love and a place as a respected member of society.

In the setting of what is present-day Kazakhstan, Tolstoy examines two psychological problems. The only problem is that she is promised to a Cossack warrior. It is here, among the Tatars, the Chechens, and the Old Believers, that he will fall in love with a beautiful Cossack girl. Taking a post as a Cadet in the army, he finds himself assigned to the remote Cossack outpost in the Caucasus. Olenin is an aimless young nobleman who is disenchanted with city life. Leo Tolstoy's firsthand insight to the magnificent landscape and the colorful Cossack way of life is lushly descriptive, in a text translated from his manuscript by close friends. The Cossacks is based on Tolstoy's own forays into the Caucasus, abandoning his aristocrat life of gambling and carousing in Moscow and volunteering to be attached to the regular army.
