“…In these troubled times, when they are both irritable and timid, the Vronskys are far more useful to us than the great novelists—indeed, far more than these eternal ‘seekers,’ like Levin, who still end up with nothing clear and solid. As for novelists, I said it plainly there: ‘Without these Tolstoys—that is, without the great writer-artists, a great nation can live for a long time. But without the Vronskys, we won’t get through even half a century… Without them, there won’t be national writers either, because the nation itself will soon perish…’”