Book 2 Part 5 Chapter 14 (Chapter 156 overall)

Chapter Summaries: Dole: Marya Dmitrievna advises the Rostofs to return to Otradnoye. Her proposal to Natasha. Princess Mariya's letter. Anatol's letter.
Briggs: Marya's letter to Natasha. Anatole writes a letter to Natasha.
Maude: Princess Mary's letter to Natasha, who also receives one from Anatole
Pevear and Volokhonsky: The Rostovs plan to go back to Otradnoe. Natasha receives two letters.

Translation:

XIV. Morning came with its worries and vanity. All got up, moved, began talking, again came the milliner, again exited Marya Dmitrievna and called to tea. Natasha with wide open eyes, as if she wanted to intercept any aspiring in her look, anxiously looked around at all and tried to seem such the same, which she was always. After breakfast Marya Dmitrievna (this was her best time), sat down in her chair, beckoned Natasha to herself and the old count. — Well, my friends, now I all the business have thought over and here is my advice to you, — she began. — Yesterday, as you know, I was at Prince Nikolay’s; well and talked with him... He thought up to shout. And I was not shouted down! I drank all of him! — And what the same is he? — asked the count. — What is he? A madcap... He did not want to hear; well, and what to say, and so we have a poor girl tormented, — said Marya Dmitrievna. — But my advice to you, so that affairs are done away with, go home, to Otradnoe... And there wait... — Ah, no! — cried out Natasha. — No, go, — said Marya Dmitrievna. — And there wait. — If fiance now comes here — without quarreling will stay, but he here one on one with the old man will speak all and then to you come. Ilya Andreich approved this proposal, immediately realizing all its intelligence. Should the old man soften, by that it will be better to come to him in Moscow or Bald Mountains, now after; if not, then get married against his commitment alone at Otradnoe. — And it is true really, — he said. — I regret that to him I drove and carried her, — said the old count. — No, what again to pity? Arriving here, it could not be to do respect. Well, but he does not want this business, — said Marya Dmitrievna, looking for something in her reticule. — Yes and if the dowry is ready, what are you still waiting for; but that it is not ready, I will send it to you. Though I pity you, better with the Lord ride. — Finding in her reticule what she searched for, she delivered it to Natasha. This was a letter from Princess Marya. — To you she writes. How tormented, the poor thing! She is afraid that you thought that she does not love you. — Yes she does not love me, — said Natasha. — Nonsense, do not say that, — shouted Marya Dmitrievna. — I do not believe anyone; I know that she does not love me, — boldly said Natasha, taking the letter, and in her face put on a dry and spiteful determination, which made Marya Dmitrievna intently look at her and frown. — You, mother, so not to answer, — she said. — What I speak is real. Write an answer. Natasha did not answer and went into her room to read the letter from Princess Marya. Princess Marya wrote that she was in despair from what happened by the between them misunderstandings. What would have been the feelings of her father, wrote Princess Marya, she requested Natasha to believe that she could not love her as that who chose her brother, for the happiness of whom she was ready to donate all. "However," she wrote, "do not think, my father was badly situated to you. He is a sick and old person, whom one needs to excuse; but he is nice, magnanimous and will love whom will do happiness for his son." Princess Marya requested onwards, so that Natasha appointed the time when she may again see her. Reading the letter, Natasha sat at the writing table, so that to write the answer: “Pretty princess,”555 fast and mechanically she wrote and stopped. "What more could she write after only what was yesterday? Yes, yes, all this was, and now really all is another," she thought, sitting above the started by her letter. "Do I need to refuse him? Is it really needed? This is terrible!"... And so that to not think these scary thoughts, she went to Sonya and with her together began to disassemble patterns. After lunch Natasha left to her room, and again took the letter of Princess Marya. —"Is it really all over now?" she thought. "Is it really so soon all this has happened and destroyed all the former!" She throughout her previous strength remembered her love to Prince Andrey and together with that felt that she loved Kuragin. She lively presented herself as the wife of Prince Andrey, presented to herself so many times repeated to her imagination the picture of happiness with him and together with that, flaring up from excitement, presented to herself all the details of her date yesterday with Anatole. "From what again would this not be together?" Sometimes, in perfect blackout, she thought. "So only I would be really happy, but now I should choose or be without one of the two and I cannot be happy. One," she thought: "says that what was, Prince Andrey or hide — equally impossible. But with this nothing is spoiled. Yet is it really to part forever with this happiness of the love of Prince Andrey, which I have lived for so long?" — Young lady, — whispering with a mysterious look said a girl, entering into the room. — I by one person was told to deliver. — The girl gave a letter. — Only for Christ... — said still the girl, when Natasha, not thinking, in mechanical movement broke the seal and read an amorous letter from Anatole, of which she, not understanding the words, understood only — that this letter was from him, from this man whom she loved. "Yes I love him, otherwise could what happened have happened? Don't I have an amorous letter from him in my hands?" With shaking hands Natasha held this passionate, amorous letter, composed for Anatole by Dolohov, and, reading it, found in it echoes that only to her it seemed, she felt. "With yesterday evening my fate was decided: be beloved by you or die. To me there is no other exit", — began the letter. Then he wrote that he knows about how her relatives will not give her to him, Anatole, that in this are secret causes which he alone may open to her, but that should she love him, then to her it is worth to say this word yes, and no human forces will interfere with their bliss. Love conquers all. He will abduct and take her away to the edge of the world. "Yes, yes, I love him!" thought Natasha, rereading for the twentieth time the letter and looking for some special deep meaning in each of his words. On this evening Marya Dmitrievna rode to Arharov's and proposed to the young ladies to go with her. Natasha under the pretext of head pain was left at home. 555 "Chère princesse", ("Dear princess",)
Time: morning, after breakfast, after dinner, that evening

Locations: Marya Dmitrievna's home
Mentioned: Otradnoe, Moscow, Lysyya Gory

Pevear and Volokhonsky Notes: Marya Dmitrievna convinces the count to go back to the country and wait for Andrei there. Princess Marya Bolkonsky tries to ask for forgiveness via letter. But more importantly, Anatole has written a love letter and this decides it for Natasha.

Characters (characters who do not appear, but are mentioned are placed in italics. First appearances are in Bold. First mentions are underlined. Final appearance denoted by *):

Marya Dmitrievna

Natasha

Prince Nikolai (also “father”)

Count Ilya Andreyitch (also “old count”)

Prince Andrei (also “your betrothed” and “son)

Princess Mariya

Sonya

Anatol Kuragin

Dolokhof

Arkharof (again as a family name as a place someone goes to.)

(there is also a maid that hands Natasha the note from Anatol.)

Abridged Versions: No break in Bell.
Gibian: Chapter 14

Fuller: Chapter is preserved.

Komroff: Most of the early part of the chapter is cut out, jumping from the breakfast to Natasha receiving Anatole’s love letter. This removes Marya Dmitrievna going over her visit with Old Prince Bolkonsky, the letter from
Mariya, the count’s decision to go back to the country, etc. Line break.

Kropotkin: Chapter 9: Chapter is preserved.

Bromfield: No corresponding chapter.
Simmons: Chapter 14: chapter basically preserved other than the very beginning.

Additional Notes: Moser & Rowe: Page 48: (the cycles of Andrey): love for Natasha...four...elope with Anatole

The Devil (Maude): "Liza used continually to fall in love with all the attractive men she met and was animated and happy only when she was in love."

Letters (Christian): 26 June. Valeriya in a white dress. Very sweet. Spent one of the pleasantest days of my life. Do I love her seriously? And can she love for long? Those are two questions I would like to solve for myself,

but can’t.