I’ve never read Anna Karenina. In fact, I’ve never read anything by Tolstoy. I love to read (and by God the Russians did it right) but though it comes as somewhat of an embarrassing admission, there’s something in me that approaches those 1,000-page tomes with severe intimidation. This philistine has probably shrugged off a great deal of ‘important’ literature based solely on its physical magnitude, and really I don’t know why that is; if there’s something in my subconscious that wants to keep the learning curve corralled to less than 400 pages or so, or if, instinctively, I’ve always regarded such volumes as a burden both on my brain and my time. I think this behavior has kept much of my learning undeveloped, unfledged, at a complete standstill.

It hasn’t always been this way. I mean, there are several ‘epics’ I’ve been able to blow through with relative ease (to escape my immediate surroundings I once read half of Steinbeck’s East of Eden on a 13-hour Grey Hound bus from New York to Ohio) but my penchant to reach for the novella before the extended narrative has largely been par for the course. The issue reared its ugly head again several months ago when perusing the isles at a local bookstore, where I stumbled upon a recent reprinting of Anna Karenina. As an impulse I decided to pick it up. I later admitted to a friend that I’d probably never get around to reading it, and throughout the course of the conversation I became a little defensive in this admission — and later made a bet that I could read the book in five days or less. At almost 800 pages, it rounds out to an average of 160 pages a day. Not exactly easy, but not impossible. Given my history with ‘big’ books though, it wasn’t going to happen.

Fast forward a few months and the book remained on my shelf, the folded nub of a receipt protruding from the pages like a middle finger in the stacks, reminding me of the daunting, unfulfilled challenge. I’d passed the shelf on trips to the bathroom or to bed, and I’d look at its thick, terrible spine and hear the taunts. You really are such a simpleton.

Completely unrelated subject: during the same period of time, two acquaintances of mine underwent a self-imposed detoxing regimen that has been quite the rage in recent years, the so-called “Master Cleanse.” For those of you not in the know, the Master Cleanse is a liquid mono-diet where, for a minimum of 10 days you eat no food and consume only a lemonade mixture made with organic B-grade maple syrup, fresh-squeezed lemon juice and cayenne pepper. This ‘cleanse’ is purportedly capable of eliminating the body of toxins, cleansing the kidneys and digestive tract, creating tremendous weight loss and promoting overall health in this pestiferous environment in which we live. Color me intrigued.

I did a bit of investigating and read up on the cleanse. Cursory research told me it’s a real crock: the Master Cleanse wasn’t developed by a doctor or licensed nutritionist, but was concocted in the 1940s by nudist Stanley Burroughs. Burroughs was convicted in 1960 of practicing medicine without a license, and was convicted in 1984 (though later acquitted) of second-degree felony murder after convincing a cancer victim to forgo all traditional treatment and sever all ties with his doctor in exchange for paying Burroughs a hefty fee for a month-long private session involving a 30-day version of the Master Cleanse, a serious of “deep body massages” and constant exposure to colored lights through plastic sheets. Several weeks into this “treatment,” the patient began experiencing severe pain, bouts of vomiting and convulsions. Burroughs convinced him that he was simply experiencing the standard withdrawal symptoms of detox. The sessions continued, and the patient died several days later. Doctors later determined the death was caused massive hemorrhaging in the abdomen, a result of Burroughs’ ‘heavy’ massaging.

Needless to say, you’d be hard-pressed to find a licensed doctor in the U.S. who supports this or any similar ‘cleansing’ programs. They’re relatively harmless, but to this day ‘cleanses’ remain a fad science: there hasn’t been one peer scientific study that has proved any effectiveness to cleansing. Besides, the lungs, the kidneys and the intestines — they’re already excellent in their abilities to rid ourselves of toxins (I mean, they’ve evolved over millions of years to do just that). The only proven benefit this ‘cleanse’ has is … gasp … weight loss. You lose weight on the cleanse because you are, essentially, starving yourself. Concentration camps are also a proven regimen for weigh loss, but you don’t hear San Franciscoans extolling the virtues of the ‘Organic Belsen Cleanse’ in between Yoga sessions and Chakra realignments (though I would so support this idea).

Regardless,  I know a number of people who have sworn by the cleanse: they say it makes them feel better, gives them energy and causes them to loose a lot of weight, fast. Incidentally, I feel like hammered shit most of the time. And hey, I’m a glutton for punishment. Fuck it, I’ll try the frou frou cleanse and see if I feel a difference. You know what, I’ll kill two birds with one stone and try the frou frou cleanse while I force myself to read Anna Karenina in the allotted five days. I don’t have anything better to do. This should be easy enough.

Day 1: I wake up around 12 p.m. I forgo the coffee (much to my chagrin, the diet calls for no caffeine) and make the lemonade recipe instead. It tastes like shit. I go running at around 1:30. By 3 p.m. I find myself people-watching from a bench in the local park. After a while it dawns on me that it would have been a good idea to bring the book along. A little late for that. It’s a beautiful day and I sit for a while longer. I’m starting to get hungry.

I arrive home at 4 p.m. I return a phone call I missed and spend the next hour on the phone. At around 5:30 I finally sit down and began to galumph my way through the book. It begins with a great line: “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” After the first dozen pages or so I find myself surprised at what a quick and easy read it is. The only thing that really bothers me about the book is — big Russian surprise — all the last names sound alike (all ending with either ‘ich’ or ‘sky’). To make it more confusing, characters are referred to with any variation of their last names (formal, maiden, nickname, etc.) based on the social setting they’re in at the time. The result is a lot of back-tracking to make sure I have the characters straight. I should have brought a pen and paper.

The book starts off with Prince Stepan Arkadyevitch Oblonsky (known variously throughout the book as Stepan Arkadyevitch, Prince Arkadyevitch, Oblonsky, or simply by the nickname “Stiva”). Stepan is an incorrigible playboy who’s in the doghouse because he was recently caught cheating on his wife, Darya Alexandrovna Oblonskaya, (or Princess Alexandrovna, or “Dolly”). Stepan’s friend Levin swings into Moscow for an unexpected visit (real name Konstantin Dmitrievich Levin, or “Kostya”). Levin is a doe-eyed idealist who recently quit his job on city counsel so he could work in the fields of his farm full-time. Levin is in love with Dolly’s younger sister, Ekaterina Alexandrovna Shcherbatskaya, (aka “Kitty,” aka I’m-about-to-stab my-fucking-eyes-out-with-a-fucking pencil-already). There’s only one problem: Stepan tells Levin that another guy has already been working on Kitty for the better part of a year, the handsome Count Alexei Kirillovich Vronsky. The next day Stepan and Vronsky (who are also friends) go the train station to pick up Stepan’s married sister, Anna Arkadyevna Karenina, who has arrived from St. Petersburg. Levin goes to Kitty’s house to propose to her, and is turned down. Kitty hopes that Vronsky will propose to her instead, and indeed, Vronsky shows up and swings his cock around with complete impunity. No proposal comes though, and later at the local dance Kitty gets the real shaft when she sees Vronsky dancing with Anna. Dun-dun-dun.

I love how the characters in this book are introduced. On page 18, a friend of Oblonsky’s is referred to as a ‘Kammerjunker,’ which in German translates to a “gentleman of the bedchamber.” Friends, take note: I want this to be my nickname from now on.

At 11 p.m. I put the book down. I’ve only gone through 72 pages. I’ve now had more than a half-dozen glasses of the lemonade and already I’m sick to death of it. I lay down in bed and turn the lights off. I’m really hungry. It’s going to be a long week.

To be continued…