satisfaction

A group of people is a powerful mixture of competing ambitions, and its idealism finds little satisfaction in agriculture. Instead of changing the world, Blithedale community members individually follow selfish paths that ultimately lead to tragedy. Hawthorne’s tale simultaneously mourns and saturates a rural idyll, not unlike the history of America in the 19th century as a whole.

At the beginning of the story, walking along an incline, some of Tolstoy’s characters lie, commit robberies and even killings. The author allows his heroes to experience feelings of satisfaction and complete impunity, after they have committed terrible atrocities. Pelageyushkin, going to the massacres, is content with one own impunity. Tolstoy conducts his heroes in hellish circles: all terrible crimes...