Leo Tolstoy’s Hadji Murad is considered one of his last great works, ranking alongside Anna Karenina. My attraction to this book was simple: a Muslim name and a Russian author. The internet calls it an accurate depiction of the Caucasian-Russian conflict. From the point of view of a Muslim-born reader, I was sceptical. A few pages in, Tolstoy follows the namaz of Hadji Murad, and the scene feels observed rather than understood. The ritual appears disordered, as though reconstructed from sight. Surprisingly, Tolstoy does not attempt to explain Islam. He only hints at it through mentions of God and Arabic phrases. He adds gender division in Muslim culture without elaborating on it and subtly draws a contrast to it through the societal objectification of Russian women. This results in not just misrepresentation but also a sense of distance from a culture.
The Caucasian-Russian conflict is strikingly similar to modern American interference in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Iran. The superpowers at the top make decisions, and the common man on both sides suffers. Across time, violence is justified through narratives. A war is deemed necessary in the name of morals and peace. Empires take it upon themselves to civilise foreign nations while dwelling on their lands, masking the real agenda behind it: exploitation, benefit, and control. What Tolstoy does succeed in illustrating is one single notion: real wars do not make it into books. There is no heroic glory associated with Hadji Murad, only appreciation of his vitality in a morally empty, chaotic world. He is compared to a crushed thistle which rises despite destruction. Trampled, yet persistently alive.
The “truth” of war never fully enters literature; what remains are fragments, shaped by those who tell them. The narrator controls the frame. The character’s inner voice becomes hard to trust when the narrator is driving it. With Imam Shamil’s portrayal, it is evident. Tolstoy portrays him as outwardly pious yet internally reluctant, praying only for appearances. Imam Shamil was a prominent figure in the Sufi tradition, and this representation only invites doubt. While Tolstoy himself served in the region, such moments reveal underlying assumptions. From an Orientalist perspective, Tolstoy succeeds and falters at once. He exposes the corruption of imperial power and the indifference of the Russian elite, yet his depiction of Muslim life often feels external.
His portrayal of Muslim men as sexually frustrated and outwardly polite makes one realise the narrator cannot shake orientalism. Tolstoy critiques the empire, but he cannot fully shed his Russian nationality. His gaze does not extend beyond the empire. He looks at the conflict from one side, not from a neutral ground. The Tsar is shown as corrupt and blind in power, absurdly ruling a kingdom. Yet the narrative never justifies the resistance of the Caucasian people, despite showing the burning of their homes and their massacre by Russian regiments.
The author does not invite sympathy for them. He does, however, humanise the common Russian soldiers. He gives them backstories and makes them victims of a system. The Caucasians suffer collectively. Their individuality does not extend beyond devotion to their leaders. The author decides who gets interiority. A narrator cannot be neutral in war literature if he was involved in it. But he could not depict it deeply if he weren’t to.
Hadji Murad is a powerful and flawed text. Tolstoy rewrites history from the outside but cannot fully access the inside: a reminder of the human factor in war and the inability to escape an imperial perspective.