Lev Tolstoy was not hostile to the natural sciences, although the impression that he was is understandable given his critical remarks about contemporary medicine. Throughout his life, Tolstoy remained consistently aware of developments in the natural sciences, and if some of his polemical representations about them are taken out of context, it is possible to misinterpret his positions. This chapter places three of his more prominent negative engagements with the sciences in context to show how those views emerged from specific local circumstances. First, his dismissal of university education in the sciences is juxtaposed with his own education in Kazan. Second, his very prominent rejection in Anna Karenina of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection adopted a specific ethical stance in the context of a vibrant Russian debate about the biological and philosophical limitations of Darwinism. And, finally, his satirizing of séances and “spiritualism” in his play The Fruits of Enlightenment is examined as emerging from his domestic surroundings.

Chapter three tracks the geographical expansion of the legal reform, exploring the debates and negotiations around its implementation in Crimea and Kazan. In order to better contextualize this implementation, it first discusses the changing political climate after the Great Reforms and the limited politicization of the emerging public sphere, which also affected provincial cities such as Kazan. Pragmatic concerns over resources and infrastructure came to play as important a role as political and ideological concerns over power and authority. The chapter shows that the reform had to be negotiated carefully at the provincial and local levels, with occasional clashes disrupting the process, as a range of individuals and institutions advanced their positions and defended specific interests. In charting these negotiations and controversies, the chapter also paints a detailed ethnographic portrait of communication and administrative interaction in post-reform Russia.