B. Historical necessity
Although Tolstoy has provided an exhaustive discussion of historic causality in War and Peace, his concept of "historical necessity" informs the destiny of characters in Anna Karenina. The term expresses the conditions in which human consciousness operates: "necessity" provides the form, "consciousness" provides the content. This is merely to paraphrase the thesis that history describes the dynamics of personality (or culture) responding to environmental challenge.
"Historical necessity" is illustrated in Anna Karenina according to the personal destinies of the main characters as they react to changing circumstances. Anna's adultery, for example, provides the necessity — that is, the structure — in which Anna, Vronsky, Karenin must retrench their values to overcome the crisis they face. How they meet the challenge of their situation generates the dynamics of the story. Levin's "necessity," how to come to terms with death, forces him to evolve a personal philosophy — a "moral consciousness" — in order to fulfill his life demands.
The nature of each one's response to his particular challenge, however, is defined by the heredity, education, environment which limits his nature. These factors explain why Vronsky remains selfish and fails in love, why Anna commits suicide, why Karenin succumbs to Lydia Ivanovna's influence, why Kitty cannot be like Varenka.
Historical necessity, therefore, is merely a verbal construct which helps us to explain the context in which human awareness operates. In War and Peace Tolstoy gives special attention to the forces of mass consciousness and cultural change. Anna Karenina, on a much more intimate level, illustrates the forces which allow individuals to confront challenges. They must, like Levin, overcome the crisis, compromise through stagnation, like Karenin and Vronsky, or succumb through death, like Anna.
