Tolstoy's story "Three Deaths" (1858) has been condescended to by his greatest critics. This is what Bakhtin wrote: "This work not large in size but nevertheless tri-leveled is very characteristic of Tolstoy's monologic manner."

Three deaths are portrayed in the story the deaths of a rich noblewoman a coachman and a tree.

Other story in the book: 'Two Hussars' is about the impression that a count creates on people in a small town and how many years later his son comes to the same place but leaves a different sort of impression.