Found: Tolstoy's short version of 'War and Peace'

With its exhaustive dissection of 19th-century Russian society, Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace is arguably the greatest, and certainly one of the longest, novels ever written.

Now, for those unable to face wading through its 1,500 pages, there is hope. What is being billed as Tolstoy's "original version" is to be published - some 600 pages lighter, with the removal of Tolstoy's philosophical musings and the prospect of a happy ending. Not everyone, however, is pleased. Academics fear many will be tempted to settle for what they regard as an unfinished version.

The new book was the life's work of Russian scholar Evelina Zaidenshnur, who for 50 years pored over thousands of pages to assemble Tolstoy's first draft, matching different inks, changes in handwriting and types of paper to piece together the author's earliest version.

That work, originally intended for circulation among fellow scholars, is to be published by Fourth Estate in April in an English translation by Andrew Bromfield. War and Peace: The Original Version, weighs in at a relatively svelte 900 pages.

Commissioning editor Clare Reihill said yesterday: "There's potentially a very large audience ... such as those who found the original length daunting."

Tolstoy's masterpiece examines Napoleon's invasion of Russia in the early 19th century, traced through the lives of several aristocratic families. The plot is interspersed with essays about war and power.

Jenny Coates, editor of the new book, said: "It was very much as an experimental work and there has never been anything like it before or since. Tolstoy didn't want the constraints of the novel, with a beginning, middle and end, so it was very much a massive stream which begins somewhat arbitrarily and ends arbitrarily, so the story could continue to flow when you close the book.

"With this version you have the bare bones but don't have all the philosophical elements of the published version. You can compare it to the most fantastic sketch for a brilliant oil painting, like a drawing for the real thing." There are fewer deaths, more peace, and some characters swap traits or vanish entirely.

"For people who know and love War and Peace it will show how it grew," said Ms Coates. "For those who don't know the book it will be still be something wonderful, and they will know there is another great feast to come."

Tony Briggs, emeritus professor of Russian language and literature and author of a bestselling translation of War and Peace, disapproves, however.

"To claim that it's the 'original' is entirely spurious and is simply selling the novel short," he said. "This is a sanitised Hollywood happy-ending version where everyone lives happily ever after. But frankly this is an outrage and no one should be misled.

"The moment Tolstoy thought of these ideas, he rejected them and went on to rewrite them."

"I'm not knocking Andrew Bromfield's translation, which I'm sure will be very good, but he has translated a version that ought never to have been seen."

The Reduced Tolstoy (in 155 words)

Can't face even the 900-page version? Adam Long, co-writer of 'The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged)' and Radio 4's recent 'Condensed History of Tony Blair', has produced a reduced 'War and Peace'

Sonya and Natasha say bye to their boyfriends, Boris and Nicholas, who are going off to fight Napoleon, and they promise to be faithful, but Natasha is really fickle and as soon as Prince Andrew shows up she promises to marry him, and as he goes off to war she decides to run off with Anatole, but Sonya saves herself for Nicholas because she's a symbol of selfless and unconditional love. Meanwhile, the Russians are fighting the French and finally the Battle of 1812 happens, complete with cannon. So Sonya waits for Nicholas for years, and when he shows up he says his family's broke and he needs to marry this rich chick if that's OK and she says sure, because if you're a symbol of selfless and unconditional love you get dumped on all the time. And they all live happily ever after, except for the French, who are destroyed by a final Cossack attack.