Controversial upon its publication in 1890, The Kreutzer Sonata illuminates Tolstoy's then-feverish Christian ideals, his conflicts with lust and the hypocrisies of nineteenth-century marriage, and his thinking on the role of art and music in society. The Kreutzer Sonata is essentially a discussion in which the character Pozdnyshev tells of his disasterous marriage. A cautionary tale, it is a declamation against immorality and sexual indulgence.