The story: “Master & Man” by Leo Tolstoy, Is a short story, which I believe to be written extremely well, for the short, 48 pages the book has. The plot of the story seems extremely realistic, and its almost like the author watched something happen, and created an extremely accurate depiction, even though the story is fictional. The way that Leo Tolstoy builds suspense, or creates emotion in his writing is done very well, and it differs from a lot of books that are out there. Instead of going overboard with suspense, or level of emotion, Leo Tolstoy goes for a much more accurate depiction of it. Leo Tolstoy perfectly depicts the thoughts that would be going through the average persons head when they are in a scenario that is life-threatening. He makes the characters be frantically thinking for the first part of the situation, but as the situation gets worse, and they realize that there is nothing they can do, their thoughts get more calm. This is shown during the time Vasili and Nikita are stuck in the snow.
The ending of the story particularly stood out to me. Vasili is a character known for his selfishness, he rarely tries to help others, but, at the ending of the story, Vasili sacrifices his life in order to save Nikita. I think that the message Leo Tolstoy was trying to convey was: “Anyone can change if put in a certain situation”.
Adding on to Vasili being known as selfish, he is also very greedy, which gives the reader a bad impression about Vasili. Nikita, is quite the opposite. Nikita is not greedy, which makes sense for the circumstances he is placed in. Nikita, being a poor person, naturally cant be greedy, as he has lived his whole life without knowing what it’s like to have a lot of money. Even though Nikita isn’t greedy, it doesn’t mean he is 100% nice. also has a very important negative quality: his alchoholism. His alchoholism makes his wife afraid of him, and when he is drunk, he will sell his clothes for alchohol. The reason that these character traits are important, is because it shows how Leo Tolstoy is skilled in character creation. Leo Tolstoy made it easy to feel empathy for Nikita, because of the situation he is in, but he also made it possible for the readers to dislike him because of his alchoholism.
The Author, Leo Tolstoy also shows his superb writing skills in just the title, “Master & Man”. During the beginning of the story, we automatically assume that Vasili is the “Master”, and Nikita is the “Man”, but towards the end of the short story, Nikita refers to God as the “Chief Master”, which makes the reader contemplate if Vasili is really the “Master”, or if God is the “Master”. This is a good technique that writers use, where the author lets the reader come up with their own explanation for part of the story.
To sum everything up, The story: “Master & Man” written by Leo Tolstoy, is an extraordinarily well crafted piece of literature, even for the short, 48 pages that it covers. And I was impressed by the level of writing.