I recently discovered that in the final fifteen years of his life, Leo Tolstoy was focused on collecting wisdom quotations and writing reflections on them. He wanted to surround himself with a “circle of reading” that would guide his attempt to live a good life. His A Calendar of Wisdom was banned in Russia after it was published in 1912 and was only made available in an English translation in 1997. Learning of Tolstoy’s love of wisdom quotations and his creation of a book ab