Annotated: Tolstoy, the opening of «А́нна Каре́нина» | Russian Grammar

The opening sentence of Tolstoy's «А́нна Каре́нина» (1877) is one of the most famous in world literature, and it is built on a tight grammatical contrast that an attentive reader of Russian can feel directly. In a single balanced line Tolstoy sets a universal (все счастли́вые се́мьи, "all happy families") against an individual (ка́ждая несчастли́вая семья́, "each unhappy family"), and the grammar of that contrast — plural все versus singular ка́ждая, a shared resemblance versus a private uniqueness — is the whole thought. This page reads the sentence in two halves, then unpacks each grammatical feature.

The text

Все счастли́вые се́мьи похо́жи друг на дру́га,

All happy families resemble one another,

ка́ждая несчастли́вая семья́ несчастли́ва по-сво́ему.

each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

все vs ка́ждая: all (together) vs each (separately)

The hinge of the sentence is the opposition between все and ка́ждая. все is the plural of весь ("all, whole") and means "all" in the collective sense — the happy families taken together, as a group. It governs a plural noun (се́мьи) and a plural predicate (похо́жи). ка́ждая is "each / every," and it is resolutely singular — it picks out the unhappy families one at a time, individually. The shift from plural все to singular ка́ждая is not decoration: it embodies the idea. Happiness is generic and collective; unhappiness is particular and solitary. You feel the lonely singularity of each unhappy family in the very grammar.

Все се́мьи ра́зные.

All families are different. (все = all, collective, + plural)

Ка́ждая семья́ ра́зная.

Each family is different. (ка́ждая = each, singular, one at a time)

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все takes you across the whole set at once (plural agreement); ка́ждая walks the set member by member (singular agreement). Tolstoy's switch from plural to singular is the sentence's argument in miniature: the happy are alike as a group; the unhappy differ one by one. See весь / всё / все.

похо́жи: a short-form adjective as predicate

похо́жи is the short form (plural) of the adjective похо́жий ("similar, alike"). Russian adjectives have two predicative options — the long form and the short form — and certain meanings strongly favour the short form. похо́ж / похо́жа / похо́же / похо́жи ("alike, resembling") is one of the classic short-form predicates; Они́ похо́жи ("they are alike") is far more natural than the long-form alternative. The short form here is plural to agree with the plural subject все … се́мьи. The second half answers it with another short form: несчастли́ва, the feminine singular short form of несчастли́вый ("unhappy"), agreeing with the singular семья́. So the sentence is framed by a matched pair of short-form predicates — похо́жи (plural) and несчастли́ва (singular) — and the agreement again carries the all/each contrast.

Все счастли́вые се́мьи похо́жи.

All happy families are alike. (short-form plural predicate похо́жи)

Ка́ждая несчастли́вая семья́ несчастли́ва.

Each unhappy family is unhappy. (short-form feminine singular predicate несчастли́ва)

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The short adjective is the predicative form: они́ похо́жи ("they're alike"), семья́ несчастли́ва ("the family is unhappy"). It exists only as a predicate (you can't say *похо́жая семья́ here), and it agrees in gender and number but has no case. For the full picture see long vs short adjectives.

похо́жи на + accusative: how Russian says "resemble"

The verb "resemble" in Russian is the construction быть похо́жим на + accusative. "X resembles Y" = X похо́ж на Y (accusative). In the present tense the быть is dropped (Russian has no spoken present-tense "to be"), leaving simply похо́жи на + accusative. Here the object of на is the reciprocal друг дру́га ("one another"), which is in the accusative — so the literal structure is "[are] alike onto one another." A learner should lock in the preposition: it is на + accusative, never *похо́жи к or a bare instrumental.

Дочь о́чень похо́жа на мать.

The daughter looks very much like her mother. (похо́жа на + accusative мать)

Э́ти го́рода похо́жи друг на дру́га.

These cities resemble one another. (похо́жи на + accusative)

друг дру́га: the reciprocal "each other"

друг дру́га is Russian's fixed expression for "each other / one another," and its internal grammar surprises learners. It is built from друг ("friend/the one") repeated, and only the second element declines for case while the first stays frozen as друг. The preposition that governs the phrase slots between the two parts: not на друг дру́га but *друг на дру́га ("onto one another"). So Tolstoy writes похо́жи друг на дру́га — "alike onto each other." The case of the second element is whatever the verb or preposition demands: друг дру́га (accusative/genitive), друг дру́гу (dative), друг с дру́гом (instrumental), друг о дру́ге (prepositional).

Все счастли́вые се́мьи похо́жи друг на дру́га.

All happy families resemble one another. (reciprocal друг … дру́га with the preposition на wedged inside)

Они́ помога́ют друг дру́гу.

They help each other. (помога́ть takes the dative → друг дру́гу)

Мы давно́ зна́ем друг дру́га.

We've known each other for ages. (accusative друг дру́га)

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In друг дру́га only the second word changes case; the first is always друг. A preposition goes between them: друг на дру́га, друг о дру́ге, друг с дру́гом. This split looks odd but is completely fixed — memorise the pattern and apply it everywhere.

по-сво́ему: "in its own way"

The final word, по-сво́ему, is an adverb meaning "in one's own way, after one's own fashion." It is formed on the reflexive-possessive свой ("one's own") with the adverb-making frame по- … -ому (the same pattern as по-ру́сски "in Russian," по-но́вому "in a new way"). Because it is built on the reflexive свой, it always refers back to the subject of its own clause: each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way, not someone else's. по-сво́ему is the perfect closing word — it asserts the irreducible individuality of each unhappy family, which is the sentence's whole point. (For the reflexive logic behind свой, see свой and related pages.)

Ка́ждая несчастли́вая семья́ несчастли́ва по-сво́ему.

Each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. (по-сво́ему = in its own way, built on свой)

Он всё де́лает по-сво́ему.

He does everything his own way. (по-сво́ему referring back to the subject)

The aphoristic parallel structure

The sentence works as an aphorism because its two halves are grammatically mirrored and then deliberately broken. Both halves open with a quantifier + adjective + noun (Все счастли́вые се́мьи / ка́ждая несчастли́вая семья́) and close with a short-form predicate (похо́жи / несчастли́ва). The mirror invites you to expect symmetry — and the asymmetries are the meaning. Plural все answers singular ка́ждая. The first predicate looks outward to a shared likeness (похо́жи друг на дру́га); the second turns inward to a private uniqueness (несчастли́ва по-сво́ему). There is no conjunction between the clauses — Tolstoy simply juxtaposes them with a comma (asyndeton), letting the parallelism carry the logic. This balanced, conjunction-free pairing is exactly what makes the line quotable.

Все счастли́вые се́мьи похо́жи друг на дру́га, ка́ждая несчастли́вая семья́ несчастли́ва по-сво́ему.

All happy families resemble one another, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. (the full mirrored aphorism)

Vocabulary gloss

Word	Form	Meaning
все	nom. pl. of весь	all (collective)
счастли́вые	adj., nom. pl.	happy
се́мьи	nom. pl. of семья́	families
похо́жи	short adj., pl.	alike, resembling
друг дру́га	reciprocal (acc. here)	one another, each other
ка́ждая	determiner, fem. sg.	each, every
несчастли́вая	adj., fem. sg.	unhappy
несчастли́ва	short adj., fem. sg.	is unhappy (predicate)
по-сво́ему	adverb	in one's own way

A pronunciation note worth flagging: счастли́вый and несчастли́вый are spelled with letters that are not all pronounced — the сч is pronounced like щ, and the т in -стли- is silent, so счастли́вый sounds roughly like "schasli'vyj." This is standard and applies wherever the -стл- cluster appears (also in за́вистливый, etc.).

How the grammar makes the thought

The sentence is admired for compressing a whole philosophy of human happiness into one line, and it does so almost entirely through grammatical contrast. Plurality versus singularity (все / ка́ждая) makes happiness collective and unhappiness individual. The two short-form predicates frame the clauses symmetrically, then point in opposite directions — outward to resemblance, inward to uniqueness. The reciprocal друг дру́га bonds the happy families to each other; the reflexive-based по-сво́ему shuts each unhappy family inside itself. Read the grammar and you have read the idea. That is why the line survives translation imperfectly but works perfectly in Russian: the meaning lives in the inflections.

Common Mistakes

❌ Ка́ждые несчастли́вые се́мьи несчастли́вы по-сво́ему.

Number error — ка́ждый is singular; it cannot take a plural noun. Use the singular ка́ждая … семья́ … несчастли́ва.

✅ Ка́ждая несчастли́вая семья́ несчастли́ва по-сво́ему.

Each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

❌ Все се́мьи похо́жи к друг дру́гу.

Preposition/case error — 'resemble' is похо́жи на + accusative, and the preposition goes inside the reciprocal: друг на дру́га, not 'к друг дру́гу'.

✅ Все се́мьи похо́жи друг на дру́га.

All families resemble one another.

❌ Семья́ несчастли́вая по-сво́ему (as the predicate).

Form choice — as a predicate after the subject, the short form несчастли́ва is the idiomatic choice here, mirroring похо́жи; the long form несчастли́вая reads as an attribute.

✅ Семья́ несчастли́ва по-сво́ему.

The family is unhappy in its own way.

❌ … несчастли́ва по-его́му / по-её.

Form error — 'in its own way' uses the reflexive свой → по-сво́ему, which refers back to the subject; there is no *по-его́му.

✅ Ка́ждая семья́ несчастли́ва по-сво́ему.

Each family is unhappy in its own way.

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