Heroic The Personality Description of Anna Karenin
This arranged marriage with someone whom she does not love makes Anna experience unbearable unhappiness in her life. One of her unhappiness can be proved
through her dissatisfaction toward both her husband‟s odd appearance and her husband
‟s coldness. „Good heavens, why are his ears like that?‟ she thought, looking at his cold,
and especially at the cartilages of his ears pressing up against the brim of his round hat. Catching sight of her, his lips falling into their habitual sarcastic
smile and his large tired eyes looking straight at her. A disagreeable sensation
opressed her heart…she was particularly impressed by the feeling of dissatisfaction with herself which she experienced when they met p.119.
This quotation shows that whenever Anna takes a look at Karenin‟s outlook, she
always feels disatissfied and opressed. Karenin spends most of his day to take care of his own business. His life is
really apportioned and full of strict punctuality, and he rarely gives attention to Anna and his son. After he finishes his work at ministry, he does not greet Anna but gives
his whole concentration to all colleagues who have been waiting for him at home, “…he had no time to go up to Anna‟s room. He went into his study to see the various
people waiting for him with petitions and to sign some papers brought him by his private secretary” p.124.
Anna and Karenin never have an intimate conversation on their relationship as a husband and wife. All that Karenin talks about is only about the issues in society
and the things related to official stuff. “During dinner he talked a little to his wife about things in Moscow…the most part conversation was general and dealt with
Petersburg official and social affairs” p.125.
His entire cold attitude brings Anna to a conclusion that Karenin is not a type of person who can love. “Can he love? If he hadn‟t heard there was such a thing as
love he would never have used the word. He does not know what love is”p.163. His incapability to love makes Anna consider him as a machine not a human being. She
finds nothing good but bad and cruel in Karenin,”He is a cruel machine when he is angry…as she spoke, with every detail of his personality and his manner of speaking,
setting against him every defect she could find” p.207. Being ignored by her husband, Anna begins to hate Karenin. She feels that
Karenin is not as remarkable as what the society thinks about him. His good attitude is only used to keep his good reputation in society. As her husband, Karenin is only a
person who brings destruction and humiliation into her life. People say he‟s so religious, so high-principled, so upright, so clever; but they
don‟t see what I‟ve seen. They don‟t know how for eight years he has crushed my life, crushed everything that
was living in me…They don‟t know how at every step he‟s humiliated me and remained self-satisfied p.314.
The unhappy marriage between Anna and Karenin is caused by the absence of love between both of them. This condition makes Anna realize that as a human being
she needs to love and be loved by someone. She does try to love Karenin, but Karenin cannot love her in return, and it makes Anna can no longer endure him. Being aware
of this situation, Anna feels motivated to fulfill her needs of love and belongingness at the outside world.
He has never once thought that I‟m a live woman in need of love…Haven‟t I struggled to love him, to love my son when I could no longer love my
husband? But the time came when I realized I couldn‟t deceive myself any
longer, that I was alive, that I was not to blame, that God had made me so that I need to love and live p.314.
From the quotation above, it can be seen that Anna‟s lack of love in her marriage life has motivated her to find an affectionate relationship apart from her
husband, which later makes Anna break her gender roles and get exiled from the Petersburg society. The process of Anna‟s breaking her gender roles will be further
analyzed on the second part of this study, in which deals with Anna‟s desire to break the conservative mind of Russian society on women and marriage.