TV War and Peace puts Tolstoy's book on bestseller list for first time

Britain is racing to address the fact that only 4% of Britons have read War and Peace, with Leo Tolstoy’s doorstopping epic entering the UK’s book charts for the first time.

The BBC’s racy adaptation of Tolstoy’s tale of Russia’s invasion by Napoleon has sent the novel into the Bookseller’s top 50 for the first time since Nielsen BookScan’s records began in 1998, the magazine reports. The BBC edition of the novel sold 3,581 copies last week, putting it in 50th place in the charts, according to the Bookseller, with total sales for the BBC edition now more than 13,000 since its December release. Five other editions of War and Peace have also sold strongly, with combined sales of 2,438 copies last week.

The strong sales follow YouGov’s recent survey, which found that only 4% of Britons have read War and Peace, although 14% wish they had. A study commissioned by BBC Store also said that War and Peace was in the top five works of fiction people are most likely to lie about having read.

“Judging by our recent sales … an awful lot of people have finally crossed this classic off their must-read list. Four different editions of the book have hit our bestseller list, shifting an almost equal number of copies each,” said Waterstones buyer Joseph Knobbs.

At publisher Wordsworth Editions, managing director Helen Trayler said that sales of War and Peace had grown steadily after the first episode of the new TV adaptation, with its edition in the top 20 of the Bookseller’s small publisher charts ever since the show launched. In total, Wordsworth has sold 56,157 copies in total of its 1993 edition of War and Peace, 3,054 of those since the television adaptation, according to the Bookseller.

“We saw similar sales increases on Dickens thanks to the BBC’s Dickensian series; also with Lady Chatterley’s Lover a few months ago.” said Trayler. “We raise our hats to the BBC – and other broadcasters – who bring these incredible classic literary works to the mass market. Although sometimes sniffed at by the academics, these adaptations are encouraging more people to read the classics. And that can only be a good thing.”