I am skipping the first half of the story almost entirely because I think it is less interesting or pertinent than the last half, especially the conclusion. However, the initial descriptions of the primary two characters is enlightening and helps make sense of the rest of story.
The youthful landowner was asking ten thousand rubles for the grove simply because Vasili Andreevich was offering seven thousand. Seven thousand was, however, only a third of its real value. Vasili Andreevich might perhaps have got it down to his own price, for the woods were in his district and he had a long-standing agreement with the other village dealers that no one should run up the price in another’s district,Vasili is an extremely common name in Tolstoy, appearing in The Kingdom of God is Within You, Anna Karenina, as well as War and Peace, in which two important secondary characters of completely different moral standing (Denisof and Kuragin) share the first name. The name is extremely common throughout Russian history, even sharing the name of tsars, so we shouldn't put too much emphasis on it. Interestingly, his patronymic is the one shared by Andrei Bolkonsky's father and then his son. Since this takes place in 1870s (incidentally after St. Nicolas's day, which appears in War and Peace as the feast Nikolai Bolkonsky has after he throws out Metivier), we are looking at a different class system and time period. A merchant class doesn't appear in War and Peace because for one, it didn't quite exist like it did in the 70s (though they are occasionally mentioned in War and Peace) and virtually none of Tolstoy's many many characters are even nominally connected to the merchant class. However, the thoughts expressed above aren't completely alien to War and Peace, especially in the context of Count Rostov's money problems and attempts, especially surrounding Mitenka, to sell properties to get money, as well as Pierre's attempts to manage his money when becoming a count.
Nikita, though an habitual drunkard, was not drunk that day because since the last day before the fast, when he had drunk his coat and leather boots, he had sworn off drink and had kept his vow for two months, and was still keeping it despite the temptation of the vodka that had been drunk everywhere during the first two days of the feast.Nikita is the name of a pair of servants, as well as the name of the husband of the woman that Nikolai has a relationship with near the end of the War and Peace. Here, post-emancipation of the serfs, Nikita is a member of the underclass that isn't represented as a morally strong class, but is introduced as a character in a moral crisis, but making an attempt at recovery (his treatment of his wife is discussed as a major plot and character development throughout). From here, I'm cutting to the middle of the story's climax, where the two characters are stuck in the blizzard because this is where their moral development occurs.
And having taken these things from under Vasili Andreevich, Nikita went behind the sledge, dug out a hole for himself in the snow, put straw into it, wrapped his coat well round him, covered himself with the sackcloth, and pulling his cap well down seated himself on the straw he had spread, and leant against the wooden back of the sledge to shelter himself from the wind and the snow.
Vasili Andreevich shook his head disapprovingly at what Nikita was doing, as in general he disapproved of the peasant’s stupidity and lack of education, and he began to settle himself down for the night.
The smugness of the elite class over peasant class, particularly when it comes to everyday living, is important here. This is how Pierre learns so much from Platon in War and Peace (though nearly all peasant/noble interaction in the novel previous to this, and there is almost none after, relies on the lack of communication between the classes), even though the latter is a "half-idiot". I think we can tie this to the idea of survival instincts that is more essential in the peasant class. Since their lives are harder, they have had to discover more ways to get by (similar to the ingenuity of the criminal class and the idea of "street smarts"). While Nikita tries to satisfy the needs of basic survival, Vasili thinks about what he considers higher things.
He did not wish to sleep. He lay and thought: thought ever of the one thing that constituted the sole aim, meaning, pleasure, and pride of his life—of how much money he had made and might still make, of how much other people he knew had made and possessed, and of how those others had made and were making it, and how he, like them, might still make much more. The purchase of the Goryachkin grove was a matter of immense importance to him. By that one deal he hoped to make perhaps ten thousand rubles.The greed and money-centric portrait of Vasili here makes him seem a bit one-dimensional and there is always going to be the problem of the middle class capitalists being critiqued by nobility. It is easy for someone born into money to critique those born with a little money trying to make more money, just as it is easy and oftentimes unfair for the middle class to critique criminal behavior of the poor. With that said, the comparison we've seen Tolstoy make in this story is the peasant that is attempting to make moral progress and the merchant that is attempting to make monetary progress. This mindset by the merchant makes him egocentric and see his own, very tangible and outward, goals as the superior and more meaningful of goals. This becomes apparent when it gets very dangerous for Vasili.
‘What’s the use of lying and waiting for death? Better mount the horse and get away!’ The thought suddenly occurred to him. ‘The horse will move when he has someone on his back. As for him,’ he thought of Nikita—‘it’s all the same to him whether he lives or dies. What is his life worth? He won’t grudge his life, but I have something to live for, thank God.’
Nikita, because he is fighting addiction, does not have a steady source of income (and thus has to take dangerous jobs like this one), and has failed as a family man, does not have an outward value that is readily apparent to Vasili. And this is a source of irony, as the reader knows that he is someone undergoing moral progress, has wants and needs, and is a more fully developed character than Vasili is in the narrative. This is extremely instructive for our age, which also tends to sweep people that are in these situations under the rug, put them in jail, or just let them die. Vasili does not recognize Nikita is a person with worth and sees himself as having a superior value, which I would argue nearly all of us do on a daily basis, seeing our own wants and needs as primary, or somehow more significant. We then flip and contrast this point of view with Nikita's.
The thought that he might, and very probably would, die that night occurred to him, but did not seem particularly unpleasant or dreadful. It did not seem particularly unpleasant, because his whole life had been not a continual holiday, but on the contrary an unceasing round of toil of which he was beginning to feel weary. And it did not seem particularly dreadful, because besides the masters he had served here, like Vasili Andreevich, he always felt himself dependent on the Chief Master, who had sent him into this life, and he knew that when dying he would still be in that Master’s power and would not be ill-used by Him. ‘It seems a pity to give up what one is used to and accustomed to. But there’s nothing to be done, I shall get used to the new things.’
The acceptance of death is perhaps the key theme in all of Tolstoy's work, especially his fiction. Unlike the struggling Ivan Ilyich, Nikita, because he has worked so hard throughout his life, as well as trusting in God, is able to accept death. Nikita's idea that he "shall get used to the new things" is the approach of the non-reactionary, the one who is not tied to the present or trying to hold on to the past, but at the same time, is not actively striving for something else, like the merchant Vasili, who is interested in getting rich. This passivity is not particularly attractive and can be problematic, but it is the same attitude that Platon displays in his own acceptance of his fate as a soldier, his dead daughter, the suffering of prison and the march, and then his own death. It is also the same attitude that is displayed in Platon's story that Tolstoy later made into "God Sees the Truth, But Waits", in which the false imprisonment is used as a way to rectify himself personally. The master language is certainly uncomfortable and seems to justify power structures by using the language of God, something religions and churches have been doing since the beginning of their existence. Whether this is accidental and too much of a reading or inherent in the very structure of the story and Tolstoy's thought is hard to say. He seems to sometimes to talk about God as a Father, but it isn't his main way to talk about God, and he does reject the church power structure, as seen partially in War and Peace, especially in Natasha's reaction to the prayer, and completely in The Kingdom of God is Within You. It is a subject that needs to be explored more.
He did not know whether he was dying or falling asleep, but felt equally prepared for the one as for the other.
Nikita's embracing of his death is juxtaposed by the useless fighting of it by Vasili, as he tries to ride the horse but gets almost nowhere in a rather obvious metaphor for the fighting against death, which is inevitable and only causes unhappiness, while the previously unhappy and what one might call a "failure" Nikita finds solace in his nearness in death.
‘There, and you say you are dying! Lie still and get warm, that’s our way...’ began Vasili Andreevich.
But to his great surprise he could say no more, for tears came to his eyes and his lower jaw began to quiver rapidly. He stopped speaking and only gulped down the risings in his throat. ‘Seems I was badly frightened and have gone quite weak,’ he thought. But this weakness was not only unpleasant, but gave him a peculiar joy such as he had never felt before.
‘That’s our way!’ he said to himself, experiencing a strange and solemn tenderness. He lay like that for a long time, wiping his eyes on the fur of his coat and tucking under his knee the right skirt, which the wind kept turning up.
But he longed so passionately to tell somebody of his joyful condition that he said: ‘Nikita!’
‘It’s comfortable, warm!’ came a voice from beneath.
‘There, you see, friend, I was going to perish. And you would have been frozen, and I should have...’
But again his jaws began to quiver and his eyes to fill with tears, and he could say no more.
Vasili gives himself up as a sacrifice to keep Nikita warm and through this, finds happiness. In this, he begins to discover a love for Nikita, a purpose for his life, and a connection with those outside of himself. Much like the "softening" of Andrei that precedes his death, not only does Nikita surrender in what he believes will be his death, Vasili softens and becomes tender. The connection with fellow humanity, though contrasted with the inability to communicate this happiness, is essential to Tolstoy's fictional thought and mirrors The Cossacks. Vasili discovers that the fates of Nikita and himself are linked and that separate, they would both die, completely reversing his character and revealing his moral development.
He remembered that Nikita was lying under him and that he had got warm and was alive, and it seemed to him that he was Nikita and Nikita was he, and that his life was not in himself but in Nikita. He strained his ears and heard Nikita breathing and even slightly snoring. ‘Nikita is alive, so I too am alive!’ he said to himself triumphantly.
And he remembered his money, his shop, his house, the buying and selling, and Mironov’s millions, and it was hard for him to understand why that man, called Vasili Brekhunov, had troubled himself with all those things with which he had been troubled.
‘Well, it was because he did not know what the real thing was,’ he thought, concerning that Vasili Brekhunov. ‘He did not know, but now I know and know for sure. Now I know!’ And again he heard the voice of the one who had called him before. ‘I’m coming! Coming!’ he responded gladly, and his whole being was filled with joyful emotion. He felt himself free and that nothing could hold him back any longer.
After that Vasili Andreevich neither saw, heard, nor felt anything more in this world.
Vasili, before his death, has an outer body experience that allows himself to view himself as a completely different person. In this change, he sees the frivolity of his previous life, just as Pierre is able to realize toward the end of War and Peace proper, seeing his Masonry and his different levels of regard for Napoleon as utter nonsense that is completely incomprehensible to his new being. After Vasili realizes this, he is able to embrace death and he is able to being free. Being a merchant and chasing after money tied his range of actions very narrowly. However, the newfound (and admittedly short-lived) love for others allows him to do and feel things he never had before. He does this by completely rejecting his previous self, coming out of himself and becoming one with a different person, which is love (though not romantic love of course). He literally becomes the person Jesus talks about as laying down their life for their friends.
O Lord God, it seems Thou art calling me too!’ said Nikita. ‘Thy Holy Will be done. But it’s uncanny.... Still, a man can’t die twice and must die once. If only it would come soon!’
And he again drew in his head, closed his eyes, and became unconscious, fully convinced that now he was certainly and finally dying.
The finality of death, as well as the uncertainty of timing, is the ultimate absurdity of death, and the embracing of it when it does not happen, such as it did with Andrei at Austerlitz, is only matched by the rejection of it when it is going to happen.
Nikita though chilled through was still alive. When he had been brought to, he felt sure that he was already dead and that what was taking place with him was no longer happening in this world but in the next. When he heard the peasants shouting as they dug him out and rolled the frozen body of Vasili Andreevich from off him, he was at first surprised that in the other world peasants should be shouting in the same old way and had the same kind of body, and then when he realized that he was still in this world he was sorry rather than glad, especially when he found that the toes on both his feet were frozen
Since Tolstoy was most likely what we would now call "clinically depressed" and a "suicide risk", it is not hard to see the passage about Nikita being alive and sorry for it as an eyebrow-raiser. What are we to say about the acceptance of death that is so strong that it becomes the love and longing for death? Tolstoy mocked the Young Werther-like obsession with love and death displayed by Boris in War and Peace, and certainly would have found the Werther fad ridiculous, but the point of the War and Peace scene most likely has to do with the insincerity of Boris and Julie, especially since every scene containing Boris centers around his insincerity and how he attempts to curry favor, wealth, or position. For someone with true suicidal tendencies, it is hard to say what Tolstoy might say outside of A Confession. Tolstoy found meaning in religion, or at least the teachings of Jesus, so it is hard to imagine him having secular answers to the question of suicide other than finding meaning in looking outside of oneself and in love for others.
He also took leave of his son and grandchildren, and died sincerely glad that he was relieving his son and daughter-in-law of the burden of having to feed him, and that he was now really passing from this life of which he was weary into that other life which every year and every hour grew clearer and more desirable to him. Whether he is better or worse off there where he awoke after his death, whether he was disappointed or found there what he expected, we shall all soon learn.And the very final sentence reveals the uncertainty of death, which cannot and will not in Tolstoy be resolved. Is it better to live or die? Is there something after life ends? Tolstoy, as all philosophers, thinkers, and writers, is unable to answer this question. This is the ultimate disconnect the story has to offer us: it is better to die for others than to live uselessly, to be a burden on others, whether it be an elderly that feels they have nothing to offer the family that takes care of them or to live for yourself and money rather than saving someone and feeling connected to them.
"Master and Man" does not rank as one of Tolstoy's greatest stories, and I think a lot of that has to do with the meandering in the first half. It isn't summative in the way a story like The Death of Ivan Ilyich is and doesn't have the narrative or descriptive power of more powerful stories from Tolstoy. The characters are a little flat and there aren't enough of them to really have a fleshed out story like The Cossacks, but it isn't one of his later parables that lack character development either. It doesn't pack the punch like "God Sees the Truth, But Waits", nor does it embrace its absurdity enough to be an enigma. Maybe the problem is that it is too happy of an ending to be a truly great Russian story.
However, as an intro to Tolstoy's thought process, as a supplement, or replacement for those unwilling to venture into his non-fiction work, it does its job. I would not use it as an introduction to Tolstoy in total because I don't think the quality is strong enough and people that might otherwise like his work might not find it strong enough to look for his other work. Since I've mentioned it a few times, I would recommend The Cossacks as a good intro for someone willing to read novel or close to novel length work, but not wanting to bite off War and Peace or Anna Karenina without being sure they would enjoy Tolstoy's style.
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