Master and Man

Como a pontuação dada indica, gostei muito.
Não ultrapassei o 4, pelos seguintes motivos:
- A primeira parte da história pareceu-me um pouco monótona;
- Acabei por sentir como algo forçada a necessidade de dar uma moral à história, o que a tornou um pouco previsível.
Mas 4 é uma excelente pontuação e não quero desencorajar ninguém a ler este conto, porque:
- No geral, é mesmo muito interessante de ler, especialmente as últimas 10/15 páginas;
- Dá que pensar, não é tudo dado de mão-beijada ao leitor.
Espero não estar a ser demasiado crítico. No meu caso, que gostei tanto de ler o "How much land does a man need", o conto seguinte não tinha tarefa fácil para me cativar tanto ou mais.

Wow what a story. I started reading this as I thought it was going to be similar to some of my favourite scenes in Anna Karenina, where Tolstoy wrote about the daily workings of the farm and the business deals that Levin made. But surprisingly it was nothing like that, this is more like the work of Jack London, surviving in harsh conditions.

In the story the master is desperate to make a deal to buy a piece of land and he needs to do this before anybody else can beat him to it, so he ventures out in a snow storm with his man (a peasant) they ultimately get lost and the story becomes about them realising what is truly important in their life as they try to stay alive and find their way to safety.

This is one of the best things I have read by Tolstoy, I thought these short stories were going to be weak but they have been so much better than I expected and I have enjoyed reading them. You can really see why Tolstoy is one of the best.