Leo Tolstoy
Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) is best known for his books War and Peace and Anna Karenina. But before he wrote his famous novels, Tolstoy founded and ran his own school for local peasant children. Subjects taught at the school included reading, arithmetic, history, and creative writing. It is possibly through this experience that Tolstoy developed a bit of a soft spot for telling stories, like “Papa Panov’s Special Christmas.” Originally written in French by Ruben Saillens, Tolstoy translated and adapted this timeless story of a lonely shoemaker who discovers that helping others has its own rewards.
