Analysis of Complexities of Anna Karenina's Character

Anna’s fall from grace in society is the main theme in this film. As the story opens she is a force of order and normalcy, but by the end of the novel, she has seen her entire life unravel. Her position in society lost, her marriage destroyed, her family taken from her and convinced at the end, her lover lost to her. Anna had let her emotions run wild and as a result had led her into an affair; therefore, everything that befell her was tragic, unfortunate. Given all the destruction she had caused in her life, she deserves our sympathy as no human is perfect. While I do to a short extent sympathize with her tragic ending, I cannot sympathize with her choices and everything she embodied as a character.

Anna's feelings for her husband are anything but indicative of a woman who hates him. She indeed admired him; she may not have felt immense 'love' or passion, but the makings of such love existed. When her infatuation for Vronsky began, she made a pitiful effort in controlling those thoughts given the fact she was a married woman. She was intrigued by them; instead of recognizing where such thinking would lead; such as to the creation of deeper feelings for him, she continued to widen the crevice of her heart, giving way for those emotions to become ever more deeply rooted. There was already so much she could have done at that point to preserve her feelings; her loyalty to her husband and her devotion to her son, before she embarked on that love affair. But engulfed by passion, a passion she was too reckless to contain and too careless to see where it would end up. She pursued the feeling with arrogance. The deeper she fell into them the farther she was pushed away from Alexei and the more irrational and exaggerated her feelings for Vronsky became.

Truthfully i do not fully sympathize with Anna given her irresponsible and irrational actions but she certainly arouses a minor sense of sympathy because all her actions were driven by an intense, deep emotion; love. What she should have done, was to have recognized her dissatisfaction with her life. She should have discussed with Alexei, her husband, who was perfectly able and reasonable enough to sit and discuss the state of their relationship. She could have talked with him, expressed herself to him. Love could have existed and been developed if she cared enough to do it, but Anna gave in to her dangerous irrationality of emotion.