When Becky, Elisabeth and I launched our #WarAndPeace2022 Readalong on 5 January we were full of excitement about taking on a wonderful project: reading Tolstoy’s War and Peace a chapter a day through the year. It would be a community read which allowed us to tackle a hitherto daunting book while sharing quotes and comments along the way.
Of course we had no idea that Russia would escalate matters so dramatically and tragically in Ukraine.
The devastating and heatbreaking attack by Russia on Ukraine has thrown a chilling new perspective on Tolstoy’s story of war across mid-Eurasia. In the light of these developments, I cannot bring myself to share jolly tweets and blog posts about War and Peace of all books.
There is little I feel I can actually do to help in this situation. But there is something I can avoid doing, and that is to carry on as originally planned with my Readalong posts as if nothing is happening. Becky and Elisabeth are in agreement that to do so would be insensitive, unfeeling and uncaring.
We will keep the Readalong under review for now. Our hope is, of course, that matters between Russia and Ukraine can be resolved quickly, in which case we may be able to return to our plans. In the meantime, I am diverting my W&P reading time to some of the fiction and non-fiction books on the excellent lists below.
We send our love and hopes for peace to the people of Ukraine. 💙💛🇺🇦💛💙