Fathers and Sons

If you're intimidated by Tolstoy or Dostoevsky's long masterpieces, consider starting instead with Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons." This book is of course a masterpiece of Russian literature. It's characters and themes are timeless and absolutely relatable to our modern culture. This is a story of family relationships, romance, and philosophy. Highly recommended. p.s. When you're done here, try "War and Peace" or at least... Read Full Review

This is such a wonderful novel about two young men returning home from University - Arkady Kirsanov and his friend, Yevgeny who is known mostly as Basarov. Firstly they stop at Arkady's father's poor farm - but he is a landowner. Arkady's father's name is Nikolai and living with him is his brother Pavel. What contrasts we immediately meet - Nikolai whose wife has died (Arkady's mother) but who is living with one of the local... Read Full Review

As Turgenev preceded Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, I always assumed that he belonged to a stuffier time; picking up "Fathers and Sons" in the bookstore, the first few pages seemed to confirm this assumption. Unlike Dostoevsky's prose, which I've always found compulsively readable, Turgenev's style seemed dense and somewhat stilted. Thankfully, the writing gets much more fluid and engaging as the story progresses. Turgenev is in... Read Full Review

Turgenev's Fathers and Sons is a timeless novel. Set in mid-19th century Russia it follows a few weeks in the lives of two young men, Arkadi and Bazarov. Turgenev sets the characters beliefs against each other and against themselves. Fathers and Sons operates on many levels, a story of generation vs generation, of ideology vs love, new vs old and friend vs friend. Turgenev takes the pair on a journey through rural Russia... Read Full Review

Following a link from Hamsun to Gogol found Fathers and Sons. Like the manic haunted heroes of Hamsun's Mysteries and Hunger there is Turgenev's Bazarov - a nihilist passionate - a hero of a kind. Take the path from Turgenev to Lermontov then to Dostoyevsky or criss cross paths and return to Hamsun. For this reader Turgenev's beautiful Fathers and Sons is but one part of this world of inspiration and Bazarov but one example... Read Full Review