Filming the Classics: Tolstoy's Resurrection as "Thaw" Narrative

Abstract

This paper examines Mikhail Shveitser's film version of Lev Tolstoy's last major novel, Resurrection, released in two parts in 1960 and 1962. The timing of the production and release is significant, and this paper analyzes the relevance of Tolstoy's novel for soviet society during the post-Stalin ‘Thaw’. The themes of social injustice and spiritual rebirth are equally valid for Russian society in the late nineteenth century as in the immediate post-Stalin period. Of special interest is the director's use of the illustrations to the novel by Leonid Pasternak in the 1898 publication.