This work is most Russian children’s introduction to Leo Tolstoy. Part of a biographical trilogy, Childhood is one of the first attempts to dissect human feelings and thoughts, to elicit their nature and origins.
The author closely observes his hero, little Nikolai (Tolstoy himself), at a transitional stage of his life, when his father takes him to Moscow, away from his home and beloved mother, who personifies cleanliness and comfort. She later dies, whereupon Nikolai’s happy childhood abruptly ends. Tolstoy examines in detail the shame, resentment, embarrassment, excitement and other feelings that his young self experienced.