This is the way the world ends, not with a bang, but a whimper.

Levin’s visit to Anna has a striking effect on him, on Anna and on Kitty. You may choose to reflect on her power to impress people. Or you might examine her portrait. Finally, Tolstoi uses as he had in War in Peace his last pages to tell the reader what he feels he has not adequalty conveyed in his novel. Is his message, much like Dostoevsky’s, too important to be left to fiction?