Summary
Over dinner at the Oblonskys’, a guest makes a remark
that displeases Karenin, who leaves the table. He finds Dolly in
the drawing room and reveals to her his firm plans for divorce.
Hearing that Anna has cheated on Karenin, Dolly protests that Anna
will be ruined. Karenin claims there is nothing he can do.
At the same dinner, Levin and Kitty speak to each other
for the first time since her rejection of his marriage proposal.
Clearly still caring for each other greatly, they play a word game
on a card table through which they apologize to each other for their
past errors. Levin proposes to Kitty again, and she accepts. Later,
Levin tells his brother Sergei of his engagement and wanders sleeplessly
in the streets, overjoyed. When morning comes, Levin visits the Shcherbatsky
house and embraces Kitty. In a happy daze, Levin goes off to buy
flowers and presents for the engagement celebration. Levin, wishing
to be fully honest with Kitty, shows her his journals, which divulge
the fact that he is agnostic and has not been chaste prior to marriage.
Kitty is upset but ultimately forgiving.
Karenin is passed over for a government post he has been
coveting. Just after receiving this bad news, he receives a telegram announcing
that Anna is gravely ill. He arrives to learn that Anna has delivered
a baby girl, and that she is suffering from a fever from which she
is not expected to recover. Vronsky is present at Anna’s bedside.
Anna is sure she is dying, so she begs Karenin for forgiveness.
She also implores Karenin to forgive Vronsky, which Karenin tearfully
does.
When Vronsky is about to leave the house, Karenin tells
him that he has forgiven Anna and will stay by her side. Vronsky
departs with the feeling that his love for Anna, which has flagged
lately, is reviving. Back at his home, he cannot sleep, tormented
by the possibility of Anna’s death. Only half-aware of his actions,
Vronsky aims a pistol at his chest and fires. He is gravely wounded
but survives, as one of his servants quickly discovers him and sends
for doctors.
Karenin, meanwhile, is surprised by how sincerely he was
able to forgive Anna, and by the tenderness he feels toward her
newborn daughter, who is also named Anna. Later, Karenin overhears
a conversation between Anna and Betsy Tverskaya. Betsy implores
Anna to say goodbye to Vronsky before he leaves for the provincial
capital of Tashkent, where he is to be stationed. Anna refuses,
saying that there is no point in seeing Vronsky again. On the way
out, Betsy begs Karenin to allow Vronsky to visit Anna one last
time. Karenin answers that such a matter is solely his wife’s decision.
In desperate grief, Anna privately affirms to Karenin that there
is no point in seeing Vronsky again. Karenin says he is willing
to allow the affair to continue, provided that the family and children
are not disgraced.
Stiva arrives at the Karenin house. Anna privately tells
him that she cannot stand Karenin any longer. Stiva says the problem
is simple: Anna married someone whom she did not love and who was twenty
years her senior; now she loves another man, and she must decide
whether or not to stay with her husband. Anna says she does not
know what to do. Stiva speaks to Karenin, who shows him a letter
he has begun writing to Anna. The letter tells Anna that the decision
about the future of their marriage is entirely in her hands. Stiva says
that only divorce will satisfy Anna, but Karenin reminds him of the
disgrace she will suffer if she chooses such a path. Stiva mentions that
Karenin could allow Anna to escape public shame by taking responsibility
for the disgrace himself—by pretending that it was he, rather than
Anna, who committed adultery. Karenin tearfully says that he is
willing to accept this option.
