As you know, the great writer, the ruler of the thoughts of his time - Leo Tolstoy, had a big family. One of the writer’s youngest sons (the tenth child in a row) is Count Tolstoy Mikhail. It is his fate that this article is dedicated to.
Childhood and youth
Misha Tolstoy was born in 1879. At this time, his father was in a deep spiritual crisis, looking for the meaning of his life and the meaning of the life of those around him. Family relations of the Tolstoy spouses went wrong, so the younger children grew up in a rather difficult atmosphere.
Mikhail Tolstoy received more attention from his mother, Sophia Andreevna, but his father also tried to conduct serious conversations with the child and arouse a high moral spirit in him.
By the way, the boy grew up as a very kind and calm child, his family paid attention to this, who appreciated his warmth and caringness in little Misha.
Musical abilities and military service
The children of Leo Tolstoy partially inherited the talent of their great parent. It only manifested itself in them in different ways. Tolstoy Mikhail was gifted musically. From childhood he loved music, sang, played, and even tried to compose himself. Everything was easy for Mikhail: he managed to learn to play Russian folk instruments, such as balalaika and accordion, he mastered the piano very well, wrote magnificent romances, some of which survived to this day.
But despite his dream of becoming a composer or, at worst, just a performer and musician, Mikhail Tolstoy followed in his father's footsteps and chose (as befits the son of a nobleman) a military career.
He entered the service at the age of 20 in 1899. A year later, Michael received the rank of ensign. Mikhail Lvovich had to fight fairly already during the First World War. True, fate spared him: a brave officer did not die, but he survived all the horrors of the revolution, and fought during the Civil War. So instead of a musician, life made the good and generous Mikhail a military man.
Life of a Russian landowner
However, Mikhail Lvovich managed to live a piece of his life away from the city, in the lap of nature, surrounded by loving relatives. The fact is that he married quite early. Married for love. It happened back in 1901. Alexandra Vladimirovna Glebova, an educated and mentally sensitive woman, became her chosen one. 9 children were born in the marriage. Tolstoy Mikhail was as prolific as his father, Lev Nikolaevich.
The Tolstoys lived, following the example of their parents, in a small estate; their lives were quiet and solitary. If the war of 1914 had not happened, perhaps Mikhail Lvovich would have died, composing his romances and growing grandchildren and great-grandchildren. But family happiness in the bosom of nature was very short-lived. A story with her desire to change everything in the country broke into the life of this Russian family.
Emigration
As you know, L. N. Tolstoy himself died in old age in 1910. He was very skeptical about the idea of a possible revolution in Russia.
The children of Leo Tolstoy met the revolution in different ways. Although in general the attitude of the Tolstoy family towards her can be called wary. As a result, most of the former Counts of Tolstoy found themselves abroad, since they did not work out relations with the Soviet government. M.L. Tolstoy was forced to emigrate. He took his whole family with him. It happened in 1920.
Tolstoy had to tight abroad. There was no work, the former nobles were forced to interrupt random earnings and live very modestly. The family of Michael began a breakdown. The father of the family was forced to leave his spouse for a while. And although Mikhail Lvovich was supported by his friends (such as, for example, the famous Russian emigrant Fyodor Chaliapin), he still found it rather difficult.
As a result, Tolstoy decided to leave for Morocco. It was in this southern country that his sons lived, who could at least somehow financially support their already elderly father. Soon, his wife came to Tolstoy.
It was in Morocco that Mikhail wrote his only literary work. They became a kind of memoir describing how the Tolstoy family lived in Yasnaya Polyana. This novel was called "Mitya Tiverin" and was imbued with good and gentle memories of that family and that country, which could no longer be returned.
Mikhail Tolstoy died in Morocco in 1944, at the height of another terrible world war.