Isadora DZ's Key Ideas from A Gentleman in Moscow
by Amor Towles

“… that adversity presents itself in many forms; and that if a man does not master his circumstances then he is bound to be mastered by them.”

Like Robinson Crusoe stranded on the Isle of Despair, the Count would maintain his resolve by committing to the business of practicalities. Having dispensed with dreams of quick discovery, the world's Crusoes seek shelter and a source of fresh water; they teach themselves to make fire from flint; they study their island's topography, its climate, its flora and fauna, all the while keeping their eyes trained for sails on the horizon and footprints in the sand.

"Why is it that our nation above all others embraced the duel so whole-heartedly?" he asked the stairwell rhetorically. Some, no doubt, would simply dismiss it as a by-product of barbarism.

Given Russia's long, heartless winters, its familiarity with famine, its rough sense of justice, and so on, and so on, it was perfectly natural for its gentry to adopt an act of definitive violence as the means of resolving disputes.

But in the Count's considered opinion, the reason that dueling prevailed among Russian gentlemen stemmed from nothing more than their passion for the glorious and grandiose.