Summary
Natasha's family moves back to Moscow to care for her serious illness following her broken engagement. The chapter reveals Tolstoy's sharp insight into human nature through his portrayal of the doctors treating Natasha. These physicians don't actually understand her condition—Tolstoy argues that no doctor can truly know the unique disease of any individual person. Yet they serve a crucial purpose: they provide hope, structure, and the comforting illusion that something meaningful is being done. The family throws themselves into following medical routines—pills at precise times, special foods, expensive consultations with multiple doctors. This elaborate theater of care serves everyone's psychological needs. The Count feels he's doing everything money can buy for his daughter. The Countess has something to fuss over and control. Sonya proves her devotion through sleepless nights of nursing. Even Natasha finds some pleasure in being the center of such devoted attention, even as she claims the medicine is useless. Tolstoy compares this to a child running to mother to have a hurt spot kissed—the healing power isn't in the kiss itself, but in the love and attention it represents. Despite all the medical intervention, it's simply time and youth that begin to heal Natasha's heartbreak. The chapter shows how families create elaborate rituals around crisis, not because these rituals solve the problem, but because they give everyone a role to play and hope to cling to during helpless times.
Coming Up in Chapter 184
As Natasha slowly begins to recover, the outside world intrudes with news that will shake the entire Russian empire. Napoleon's forces are advancing, and the war that has seemed distant is about to arrive at Moscow's doorstep.
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An excerpt from the original text.(~500 words)
On receiving news of Natásha’s illness, the countess, though not quite well yet and still weak, went to Moscow with Pétya and the rest of the household, and the whole family moved from Márya Dmítrievna’s house to their own and settled down in town. Natásha’s illness was so serious that, fortunately for her and for her parents, the consideration of all that had caused the illness, her conduct and the breaking off of her engagement, receded into the background. She was so ill that it was impossible for them to consider in how far she was to blame for what had happened. She could not eat or sleep, grew visibly thinner, coughed, and, as the doctors made them feel, was in danger. They could not think of anything but how to help her. Doctors came to see her singly and in consultation, talked much in French, German, and Latin, blamed one another, and prescribed a great variety of medicines for all the diseases known to them, but the simple idea never occurred to any of them that they could not know the disease Natásha was suffering from, as no disease suffered by a live man can be known, for every living person has his own peculiarities and always has his own peculiar, personal, novel, complicated disease, unknown to medicine—not a disease of the lungs, liver, skin, heart, nerves, and so on mentioned in medical books, but a disease consisting of one of the innumerable combinations of the maladies of those organs. This simple thought could not occur to the doctors (as it cannot occur to a wizard that he is unable to work his charms) because the business of their lives was to cure, and they received money for it and had spent the best years of their lives on that business. But, above all, that thought was kept out of their minds by the fact that they saw they were really useful, as in fact they were to the whole Rostóv family. Their usefulness did not depend on making the patient swallow substances for the most part harmful (the harm was scarcely perceptible, as they were given in small doses), but they were useful, necessary, and indispensable because they satisfied a mental need of the invalid and of those who loved her—and that is why there are, and always will be, pseudo-healers, wise women, homeopaths, and allopaths. They satisfied that eternal human need for hope of relief, for sympathy, and that something should be done, which is felt by those who are suffering. They satisfied the need seen in its most elementary form in a child, when it wants to have a place rubbed that has been hurt. A child knocks itself and runs at once to the arms of its mother or nurse to have the aching spot rubbed or kissed, and it feels better when this is done. The child cannot believe that the strongest and wisest of its people have no remedy for its pain, and...
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Intelligence Amplifier™ Analysis
The Road of Healing Theater
When facing helplessness, people create elaborate rituals that give everyone roles to play, even when these actions don't address the core problem.
Why This Matters
Connect literature to life
This chapter teaches how to recognize when elaborate care rituals serve the helpers more than the person who's hurting.
Practice This Today
This week, notice when someone's struggling and ask yourself: 'Does this action actually help them, or does it just make me feel like I'm doing something?'
Now let's explore the literary elements.
Terms to Know
Consultation
When multiple doctors meet to discuss a patient's case together. In Tolstoy's time, this was considered the height of medical sophistication and was very expensive.
Modern Usage:
We still do this today when specialists gather for complex cases, though now it's often done virtually or through electronic records.
Medical theater
Tolstoy's concept that much of medicine is performance - doctors acting knowledgeable and families going through elaborate care rituals. The activity itself provides comfort even when it doesn't cure.
Modern Usage:
We see this when families insist on 'doing everything possible' in hospitals, or when we take multiple vitamins that probably don't help but make us feel proactive.
Broken engagement
In 19th century Russian society, breaking an engagement was a serious scandal that could ruin a woman's reputation and marriage prospects permanently.
Modern Usage:
Today we call off engagements regularly with much less social stigma, though it can still cause emotional trauma and family drama.
Nervous illness
What doctors called depression, anxiety, or emotional breakdown in Tolstoy's era. They didn't understand mental health, so they treated it like a physical disease.
Modern Usage:
We now recognize these as legitimate mental health conditions that need proper psychological treatment, not just pills and bed rest.
Family crisis rituals
The elaborate routines families create around illness or tragedy - special schedules, treatments, roles for everyone. These give structure and purpose during chaos.
Modern Usage:
We do this when someone gets cancer or faces addiction - everyone gets a job, from researching treatments to organizing meal trains.
Privileged invalidism
When being sick becomes a way to receive attention, care, and exemption from normal responsibilities. The patient may unconsciously resist getting better.
Modern Usage:
We see this in people who seem to always have health crises that require others to drop everything and focus on them.
Characters in This Chapter
Natasha
Suffering patient
She's seriously ill from heartbreak and scandal, but also somewhat enjoys being the center of everyone's worried attention. Her body is responding to emotional trauma.
Modern Equivalent:
The friend who gets physically sick from stress and secretly likes having everyone fuss over her
The Countess
Anxious mother
Natasha's mother throws herself into managing the medical care, finding purpose and control through organizing doctors, medicines, and treatments.
Modern Equivalent:
The helicopter parent who becomes an expert on their child's condition and manages every detail of treatment
The Count
Worried father
He expresses his love and helplessness by spending money on the best doctors and treatments, believing expensive care equals better care.
Modern Equivalent:
The dad who insists on going to the most expensive specialists because 'nothing's too good for my daughter'
The doctors
Professional performers
They speak in foreign languages, prescribe numerous treatments, and act very important while actually having no idea what's wrong with Natasha.
Modern Equivalent:
Specialists who order lots of tests and use medical jargon to sound authoritative when they're really just guessing
Sonya
Devoted caregiver
She stays up nights nursing Natasha, proving her loyalty to the family and finding her identity through self-sacrifice.
Modern Equivalent:
The family member who becomes the primary caregiver and martyr, defining themselves through taking care of others
Key Quotes & Analysis
"They could not know the disease Natasha was suffering from, as no disease suffered by a live man can be known, for every living person has his own peculiarities and always has his own peculiar, personal, novel, complicated disease."
Context: Tolstoy explaining why the doctors can't actually help Natasha
This reveals Tolstoy's insight that human suffering is always unique and personal. Medical science tries to categorize and treat, but real healing often comes from time and human connection, not prescriptions.
In Today's Words:
Doctors can't really understand what you're going through because everyone's pain is different and personal.
"The simple idea never occurred to any of them that they could not know the disease Natasha was suffering from."
Context: Describing the doctors' arrogant certainty about Natasha's condition
Tolstoy criticizes medical arrogance - the doctors are so busy appearing knowledgeable that they can't admit their limitations. This blinds them to the real nature of healing.
In Today's Words:
None of the doctors were humble enough to admit they had no clue what was actually wrong with her.
"She could not eat or sleep, grew visibly thinner, coughed, and, as the doctors made them feel, was in danger."
Context: Describing Natasha's physical symptoms from emotional trauma
This shows how heartbreak and shame can manifest as real physical illness. Tolstoy understood the mind-body connection long before modern psychology.
In Today's Words:
She was so heartbroken that her body was actually shutting down - she couldn't function at all.
Thematic Threads
Class
In This Chapter
The Count's wealth allows him to hire multiple expensive doctors, transforming economic privilege into the illusion of control over his daughter's emotional crisis
Development
Continues the pattern of aristocrats using money to manage problems that money cannot actually solve
In Your Life:
You might throw money at problems (expensive therapy, premium services, costly solutions) when the real issue requires time, patience, or emotional work that can't be purchased
Human Relationships
In This Chapter
Each family member finds their own way to demonstrate care through the medical routine—the Count pays, the Countess manages, Sonya nurses, creating roles that bond them in shared purpose
Development
Builds on earlier themes of how families create meaning through shared rituals, even artificial ones
In Your Life:
You might recognize how your family creates busy work during crises to feel useful, or how you take on caretaking roles that make you feel needed even when they don't help
Social Expectations
In This Chapter
The family must be seen doing everything possible for Natasha—hiring doctors, following prescriptions, showing proper concern—to meet society's expectations of devoted parents
Development
Extends the theme of performing appropriate roles rather than addressing underlying realities
In Your Life:
You might find yourself going through the motions of what looks like proper care or effort because it's what people expect, even when you know it won't work
Personal Growth
In This Chapter
Natasha's healing happens naturally through time and youth, not through any external intervention, suggesting that some growth cannot be forced or accelerated
Development
Introduced here as a counterpoint to the family's frantic activity
In Your Life:
You might recognize times when you tried to rush your own healing or growth instead of allowing natural processes to unfold at their own pace
Identity
In This Chapter
Each person's identity becomes tied to their role in Natasha's care—the devoted father, the worried mother, the faithful friend—giving them purpose during a purposeless time
Development
Continues exploring how people construct identity through their responses to crisis
In Your Life:
You might notice how your sense of self becomes wrapped up in being the helper, the fixer, or the one who 'does everything right' during family emergencies
You now have the context. Time to form your own thoughts.
Discussion Questions
- 1
Why does Natasha's family hire multiple doctors when they know medicine can't cure heartbreak?
analysis • surface - 2
How does the elaborate medical routine serve each family member's psychological needs, even though it doesn't help Natasha?
analysis • medium - 3
Where do you see this pattern of 'healing theater' in modern life - families, workplaces, or communities creating busy rituals when they feel powerless?
application • medium - 4
When someone you care about is suffering and you can't fix their problem, how do you resist the urge to create meaningless busywork and instead offer genuine support?
application • deep - 5
What does this chapter reveal about why humans need to feel useful during crisis, even when our actions don't solve the real problem?
reflection • deep
Critical Thinking Exercise
Identify Your Healing Theater
Think of a recent situation where you or your family faced a problem that couldn't be quickly fixed. List all the activities, purchases, or rituals that emerged around this crisis. Then categorize each action as either 'genuine solution' or 'healing theater' - something that made people feel useful but didn't address the core issue.
Consider:
- •Notice how healing theater often involves spending money, creating schedules, or assigning roles to family members
- •Consider whether the theater served important emotional needs, even if it didn't solve the problem
- •Think about what genuine support might have looked like instead of the busy rituals
Journaling Prompt
Write about a time when you were suffering and someone offered you genuine presence instead of trying to fix you. How did that feel different from when people tried to solve your problems with advice or activities?
Coming Up Next...
Chapter 184: Finding God in the Darkness
Moving forward, we'll examine spiritual practice can provide structure during emotional crisis, and understand accepting our flaws can be more healing than pretending to be perfect. These insights bridge the gap between classic literature and modern experience.