Natasha Rostova is 13 years old at the start of War and Peace. She is introduced in 1805 as the lively youngest daughter of Count Ilya Rostov and Countess Natalya Rostova.
Her age matters because the novel follows Natasha through a long period of personal development. She begins as an energetic adolescent who sings, dances, and moves naturally through the affectionate but financially troubled Rostov household. Early in the story, she has a youthful attachment to Boris Drubetskoy, but her emotional life changes as she grows older.
Natasha later attends her first major ball, meets Prince Andrei Bolkonsky, and becomes engaged to him. Her impulsive attraction to Anatole Kuragin causes the engagement to collapse, but the experience is part of her painful transition from adolescence to adulthood. After Andrei’s death, she eventually finds lasting companionship with Pierre Bezukhov.
Readers sometimes remember Natasha as older because famous film and television adaptations often cast adult actresses. By the novel’s end, she is 28, married to Pierre, and the mother of four children.