Tolstoy and the Green Stick
The Green Stick : A Symphonic Fairy Tale With A Vegan Message Tolstoy's grave - the location of the 'green stick'. Photo by me (2010). When the great Russian writer Leo Tolstoy was a little boy, his brother Nikolai had told him about the legend of the mysterious green stick which had a message engraved in it. That message contained the secret to universal happiness where all people would be free from illness and suffering. Although little Leo never found such stick, the idea of it captivated him throughout his adult life. Today, he is buried in the same location where he believed he may have been able to find that green stick - near the ravine in the forest of his family estate Yasnaya Polyana, south of Moscow. What could have possibly been written on that stick? I wrote a musical fairy tale for symphony orchestra based on this legend, literally titled The Green Stick , which contains my interpretation of the secret message which was engraved on that