Big Read: The Death of Ivan Ilyich  Tags: slavic literature  

Ivan Ilyich finds himself on the other side of the table, so to speak, when the celebrated doctor treats him just as he had treated men on trial. What is Tolstoy's point in making this comparison? Research the new jury courts in Russia and Tolstoy’s attitude toward them. Devise and carry out one to two role reversal exercises, and interview each other about the experience. Archive your investigation.

Research tips: Be sure to check the suggestions under "Searching for Tolstoy", "Google Books", "Another Approach", "Media", and "Biography and Bibliography" if you are having trouble getting started.

George Rapall Noyes, Tolstoy. New York : Duffield & Co. 1918, p.257.

The above example from Noyes' biography of Tolstoy describes Tolstoy's opposition to some of the Russian reforms of the 1860s. The citation above was the result of a Google Books search on the terms "Tolstoy" and "jury". There are many places to find Tolstoy's varied views on government. His letters and diaries are, of course, a major source, and a Google Books search on Tolstoy and government, limiting to "Full View" sources only, will bring up many. It is also useful to look at some of the full text sources mentioned on the "Searching Guidelines" page. All of the databases mentioned so far will have something about Tolstoy and his protests against the government.

• Academic One File
  Articles, many with full text or audio files, from current serials.
• American Periodicals Series
  Full text of articles from periodicals published in the United States from 1741-1940.
• JSTOR
  Identifies full text of older articles in many disciplines from 773 journals. Coverage for most journals included in the database begins with full text from the very first issue onwards.
• Periodicals Contents Index (PCI)
  Periodical archive of the backfiles of periodicals in the humanities and social sciences, dating from 1770 on.
• ProQuest Historical Newspapers
  Identifies articles from the New York Times and Wall Street Journal.
  

When searching for information on this topic, the following may be useful search terms:

Tolstoy government

Tolstoy protest

For example, a search in American Periodicals Series on the terms "Tolstoy government" brought up 16 matches related to various protests by the author.

As you can see, the dates were limited to a specific period.