Anna Karenina is one of the greatest novels written by Leo Tolstoy, often credited as the pinnacle of realist fiction, and described by Tolstoy himself as his first true novel.

In Sevastopol (or Sebastopol) Sketches Tolstoy examines the senselessness and vanity of war, the many aspects of the psychology of war, heroism, and the misleading presence of humanism in truces. The name originates from Sevastopol, a city in Crimea. Many of the episodes in Tolstoy's War and Peace are linked to the events described in these sketches.