Vera Rostova

The awkward elder sister in the Rostov household

BOOK ONE

Book 1, Part 1

Chapter 9

Poor Vera, the seventeen-year-old daughter of the Rostovs. Unlike her younger sister Natasha, she was brought up strictly. “The countess was too clever with Vera,” admits the count. She is good-looking, clever, well brought up, with a pleasant voice. She says all the correct things. And yet, something about her makes everyone feel awkward.

Chapter 11

It really is no fun being Vera. “You are not wanted here”, says her mother, who clearly doesn’t like her own daughter very much. Vera goes and takes her anger out on the children, who compare her to Madame de Genlis, a French writer on educational methods. Here we learn she is attached in some way to a man called Berg.

Chapter 15

Vera appears at the name-day banquet on the arm of Berg, that rather dull and egotistical young man.

Chapter 17

She continues to make people unhappy: telling Sonya that she will never be allowed to marry Nikolai. Natasha calls her “spiteful”.