War and Peace Chapter Summary & Analysis - Part 11, Chapters 1-7 Summary

Part 11, Chapters 1-7 Summary

Tolstoy philosophizes about history: "Every conclusion of history can, without the slightest effort on the part of the critic, be dissipated like dust, leaving no trace, simply through criticism selecting, as the object of its analysis, a greater or smaller disconnected unit, which it has a perfect right to do, seeing that the unit of history is always selected arbitrarily." The Russians retreat beyond Moscow. The French reach Moscow and stop there. For five weeks after that, there isn't a single battle. Kutuzov writes to the Tsar and tells him that the battle of Borodino was a victory, but his desire to attack the next day did not come to fruition. Instead, the Russian army retreats again and again from lack of motivation and consensus. After talking with some of the men, Kutuzov sees that the defense of Moscow is a physical impossibility. He can't understand how or when he...
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