Vronsky or Levin? Choose Wisely
By ELISA ALBERT
Anna Karenina’s Konstantin Dimitrich Levin—"Kostya" to his nearest and
dearest, "Levin" to most everyone else—is the ideal man. Thoughtful and
restrained, patient and hardworking, faithful, honest, deeply spiritual but freethinking, intellectual but not pompous, self-aware but not self-aggrandizing.
I didn’t read Tolstoy’s masterpiece until just recently, and boy am I glad: as a
younger lady, I, like many young ladies before me, was busy falling in love with a
real-life Count Vronsky and wouldn’t have recognized a potential Levin if he bit
me on the earlobe.
Technically, I know, Levin’s not a Nice Jewish Boy. Technically he’s not Jewish
at all. But Yisrael means “to struggle,” and Levin does plenty of that; with his
conscience, with the status quo of labor relations in Russia, with the intelligentsia
of Moscow and Petersburg, with his understanding of the workings of the world.
Tolstoy might not be pleased to hear it, but I hereby declare Levin a Jew (at least
in Lenny Bruce’s definition of Jewishness). So that’s settled.
Now I’d like to throw my hat into the lucrative romance-self-help ring (think of it as
He’s Just Not That Into You for the lit-crit set) with this handy-dandy cheat-sheet
for quick referral throughout the dating process:
Is he a Vronsky or a Levin? The lovelorn can always use edification.
A Vronsky is outwardly and immediately charming. He might be wealthy; he’s
definitely hedonistic, passionate, outwardly heroic—all of these traits are on
automatic, immediate display. You will be, in a manner of speaking, swept off
your feet by a Vronsky.
A Levin is a harder nut to crack. He’ll hang back, observe, maybe over-think
things a little, and really mean what he says when finally he speaks. He isn’t
always suave. He has very little capacity for guile. On your first date he may well
be a little nervous. He’s not necessarily the easiest man to get to know; he has
depth and character and a soulful sense of humor.
A Vronsky will make a mess of your life and disappear when it’s time to pick up
the pieces. Among his priorities, you fall somewhere between (1) take care of self
and (10) change that light bulb. The lasting bequest of any involvement with
Vronsky seems to be emotional ruin.
Levin, on the other hand—dear Levin!—will never leave you hanging. Levin is
consistent, caring, selfless and honest.
Consider:
Dashing Vronsky courts innocent young Kitty Scherbatsky, implying that a
proposal might well be on its way, and then leaves her thoughtlessly behind for
the beguiling, married Anna. Kitty is very nearly ruined—only after an extended
stay at a German “spa” does she fully recover from her broken heart and move
on, wiser and stronger. Anna, famously, fares less well.
After Anna has left her marriage and beloved young son (with unbearable
emotional and social consequences) to be with Vronsky, he bristles at her
expectation that he offer her consistent companionship and support. In a scene
midway through the book, we see just how intimately Vronsky cares for his
horse, Frou-Frou. The downfall of the horse (who breaks his leg during an
important race) troubles Vronsky significantly more than the suffering of his
beloved later on.
Vronsky’s all talk. He might be great fun in the short run, but when the going gets
tough he’s nowhere to be found. He’ll make you grand promises and shrug
mirthlessly when they go unmet.
Levin, on the other hand, spends the first part of the novel mourning the loss of
Kitty, with whom he was in love. He drowns his sorrow in good old-fashioned
hard work. Though the extended narration of his working in the fields alongside
the peasant workers is often cited as a “boring” part of the book, I couldn’t help
but fall in love with Levin as I watched him find true joy in the intense labor and in
the company of the folk who do it day in and day out.
Long after he’s given up on having love in his life and, indeed, resigned himself
to his loneliness, Levin continues to seek out a righteous existence on his own
terms. He doesn’t run out and find himself some other, random wife; he doesn’t
lose all hope in life itself, he doesn’t run from his pain. He endures his suffering,
the thwarted love, and the possibility that his work is all he’ll ever have. It takes a
real mensch, male or female, to be alone after lost love, to put one foot in front of
the other, and to carry on.
All of which makes Levin, when at long last Kitty becomes his, supremely
capable of and ready for true partnership and fatherhood. (The fact that Levin like Tolstoy himself - finds God in the end is an essay for another time entirely.)
Okay then, with that background on these polarized men, some practice tests:
1. His JDate profile contains allusions to his high salary, expensive hobbies, and
sexual prowess. In his photos he is (a) holding an alcoholic beverage; (b) putting
his arm around a headless woman; (c) sporting a tan and an excess of hair-gel;
(d) bare-chested; or (e) all of the above. He is looking specifically for a woman
between five and ten years younger than himself who is between 100 and 115
lbs. Is he a Vronsky or a Levin?
2. His JDate profile is a little bit curt—almost like he wrote it himself and is a little
sheepish about marketing himself. He doesn’t try too hard to be funny or impress
you. His picture is blurry. He honestly reports his height as 5”9. A Vronsky or a
Levin?
3. The day you have tickets to see his favorite band, you fall terribly ill and can’t
make it. “Go without me,” you tell him. He’ll have none of it, promptly selling the
tickets on craigslist and coming over to make you soup. Despite feeling like crap,
you have a lovely evening: he makes you laugh and lets you win at cards.
Vronsky or Levin?
4. You spend a week visiting your parents with him. At some point, age-old family
dynamics prove overwhelming and you freak out. He says (a) “Dude, you’re
freaking out. Get it together. I don’t need this.” Or (b) “I love all of you; even your
fucked up family. Want a cookie?”
Are we getting the hang?
Some say you have to know a Vronsky before you can appreciate a Levin. It
does seem like a sort of rite-of-passage to go through one or more Vronskys and
finally come to an understanding that it’s a Levin you want.
It’s no wonder (spoiler alert!) that poor Anna throws herself under a train. My
narrow escape from a Vronsky nearly destroyed me, too, and that was two
hundred-odd years later, sans (most) of the societal disapproval shouldered by
Anna in the novel Tolstoy named for her.
But hey: it led me to the fateful night when I met my real-life Levin, and primed
me perfectly, instinctively, to recognize him as such.
So ask yourself: Vronsky or Levin? If he’s a Levin, be patient and rejoice. If he’s
a Vronsky, please: back away from those train tracks and run for your life.