One of the greatest novels ever written, Anna Karenina explores profound questions of life, death, love and marriage which far transcend their setting in 1870s imperial Russia, and continue to have relevance for us today.  This discussion of Tolstoy’s masterpiece will show how how its exhilarating and intricate narrative both reflects events in the author’s own turbulent life and anticipates the upheaval of Revolution.

Rosamund Bartlett a writer, lecturer and translator whose work as a cultural historian ranges across the arts. She completed her doctorate at Oxford and is the author of several books, including biographies of Chekhov and Tolstoy, and a study of Wagner's influence in Russia. She is currently writing a history of the Russian avant-garde. Her new translation of Anna Karenina for Oxford World’s Classics was published to acclaim in 2014. She has written on art, music and literature for publications such as The Daily Telegraph and Apollo, and received commissions from institutions including the Royal Opera House, Tate UK, and the Salzburg Festival. Her lecturing work has taken her from the V&A and the National Theatre in London to the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney, and she contributes regularly to Proms events and opera broadcasts on the BBC.