Primary sourceBook1886
What Is to Be Done?
Leo Tolstoy · 1886
Tolstoy's 1886 non-fiction account of urban poverty in Moscow, written after his work on the city's census.
Tolstoy's own essay on poverty, growing directly from his personal experience of Moscow's social conditions.
About this source
What it is
A non-fiction work completed by Leo Tolstoy in 1886, describing the social conditions of Russia and especially the poverty he witnessed in Moscow. It was first published in English in 1887.
Why it matters
The book grew out of Tolstoy's direct experience working on the 1882 Moscow census, which exposed him to city poverty unlike anything he had known in the countryside. It shows Tolstoy using his fame as a novelist to criticise the money economy and demand social change, part of his wider turn toward moral and social writing late in life.
Look closer
- How does Tolstoy describe the difference between country and city beggars?
- Why might firsthand experience of a city census have changed his views?
- What does this text suggest about Tolstoy's attitude toward wealth and the city he lived in?
This book is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Leo Tolstoy on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.
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