On hedgehogs, foxes and leadership: Uncovering the other Tolstoy

While known for his view that heroes are nothing but “a lie and invention,” Leo Tolstoy also offered effusive praise for Abraham Lincoln, noting that America's 16th president “overshadows all other national heroes.” In this sense, the Russian novelist is something much more than a simple antidote to Thomas Carlyle's imagery of the hero and the heroic in history. There is, in fact, another Tolstoy revealed by his comments on Lincoln, as well as in his short novel Hadji Murád. And this article seeks to uncover that other Tolstoy, using Isaiah Berlin's The Hedgehog and the Fox as a guide.