DOLOKHOV, TOLSTOY AND HARRY POTTER

Abstract

The article undertakes to find out what it is that Leo Tolstoy shares with the War and Peace [Voyna i Mir] character Fedor Dolokhov. Opening with a discussion of the 2016 BBC dramatization of the novel, which pushes secondary characters like Dolokhov straight into the limelight and promotes him specifically to a major actor in the drama, the article proceeds to examine his real-life prototypes, and especially the writer’s relative, Fedor ‘the American’ Tolstoy, arguably the biggest inspiration behind Dolokhov. He may have endowed the latter with the traits of a callous duelist and adventurer. Every time Dolokhov makes an appearance in the novel, it becomes clear that he, rather than Prince Andrey or Pierre, is Tolstoy’s kindred spirit. J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter books feature a character named Antonin Dolohov, a borrowing from Tolstoy. In their pursuit of immortality, Rowling’s dark wizards would split up their soul and keep the fragments in several magical objects called horcruxes. In a way, Dolokhov is such a vessel for Tolstoy’s alter ego, something already noted by his younger English fellow writer Somerset Maugham.