Tolstoy's most accomplished novel, Anna Karenina is one of the greatest works of world literature. It is a chronicle of Russian life, passionate and moving; yet the complex twists and turns of the story are presented with a fluidity and simplicity in the narrative. The story is woven in two strands: one concerns Anna Karenina and Count Vronsky; the other, Kitty Oblonsky and Konstananin Levin. The latter is more or less the mouthpiece for Tolstoy's own ideas about what life should be.

Nicola Pagett stars as Anna Karenina in this wonderful BBC adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's powerful and timeless tale of family passions set in Imperial Russia in the 1870s. Anna is young, vivacious, beautiful and resigned to a loveless marraige of convenience to a man twenty years her senior. She moves in the highest circles of Czarist Russia and believes herself to be invunerable to temptation, however, she descends into tragedy when she meets the dashing Count Vronsky who awakens in her a passionate love.

The 10 part series was first broadcast between 25th September and 27th November 1977 on Sundays at 8.10pm and was was produced and dramatised by Donald Wilson (who also dramatised The First Churchills, also released by Acorn). Tolstoy finshed his novel exactly 100 years before this BBC production was broadcast and as such the series was highly publicised, with Pagett, Porter and Wilson appearing on the front cover of the 24-30 September 1977 edition of the Radio Times, with a 4 page colour (something quite special in 1977!) article inside. I hope to bring more of this article at a later date.

Principal Cast
Nicola Pagett	Anna Karenina
Eric Porter	Karenin
Stuart Wilson	Vronsky
Robert Swann	Levin
Caroline Langrishe	Ekaterina

Vol 1 VHS Vol 2 VHS

The entire series is available over two double videos from Acorn Media, or can be bought from choices direct using the links to the left.

I would like to thank Roger Bickerton for his help in researching this page.