Smoke

Fiction & Literature
Cover of the book Smoke by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev, anboco
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev ISBN: 9783736414235
Publisher: anboco Publication: September 6, 2016
Imprint: Language: English
Author: Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
ISBN: 9783736414235
Publisher: anboco
Publication: September 6, 2016
Imprint:
Language: English

'Smoke' was first published in 1867, several years after Turgenev had fixed his home in Baden, with his friends the Viardots. Baden at this date was a favourite resort for all circles of Russian society, and Turgenev was able to study at his leisure his countrymen as they appeared to foreign critical eyes. The novel is therefore the most cosmopolitan of all Turgenev's works. On a veiled background of the great world of European society, little groups of representative Russians, members of the aristocratic and the Young Russia parties, are etched with an incisive, unfaltering hand. Smoke, as an historical study, though it yields in importance to Fathers and Children and Virgin Soil, is of great significance to Russians. It might with truth have been named Transition, for the generation it paints was then midway between the early philosophical Nihilism-vi- of the sixties and the active political Nihilism of the seventies. Markedly transitional, however, as was the Russian mind of the days of Smoke, Turgenev, with the faculty that distinguishes the great artist from the artist of second rank, the faculty of seeking out and stamping the essential under confused and fleeting forms, has once and for ever laid bare the fundamental weakness of the Slav nature, its weakness of will. Smoke is an attack, a deserved attack, not merely on the Young Russia Party, but on all the Parties; not on the old ideas or the new ideas, but on the proneness of the Slav nature to fall a prey to a consuming weakness, a moral stagnation, a feverish ennui, the Slav nature that analyses everything with force and brilliancy, and ends, so often, by doing nothing. Smoke is the attack, bitter yet sympathetic, of a man who, with growing despair, has watched the weakness of his countrymen, while he loves his country all the more for the bitterness their sins have brought upon it.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

'Smoke' was first published in 1867, several years after Turgenev had fixed his home in Baden, with his friends the Viardots. Baden at this date was a favourite resort for all circles of Russian society, and Turgenev was able to study at his leisure his countrymen as they appeared to foreign critical eyes. The novel is therefore the most cosmopolitan of all Turgenev's works. On a veiled background of the great world of European society, little groups of representative Russians, members of the aristocratic and the Young Russia parties, are etched with an incisive, unfaltering hand. Smoke, as an historical study, though it yields in importance to Fathers and Children and Virgin Soil, is of great significance to Russians. It might with truth have been named Transition, for the generation it paints was then midway between the early philosophical Nihilism-vi- of the sixties and the active political Nihilism of the seventies. Markedly transitional, however, as was the Russian mind of the days of Smoke, Turgenev, with the faculty that distinguishes the great artist from the artist of second rank, the faculty of seeking out and stamping the essential under confused and fleeting forms, has once and for ever laid bare the fundamental weakness of the Slav nature, its weakness of will. Smoke is an attack, a deserved attack, not merely on the Young Russia Party, but on all the Parties; not on the old ideas or the new ideas, but on the proneness of the Slav nature to fall a prey to a consuming weakness, a moral stagnation, a feverish ennui, the Slav nature that analyses everything with force and brilliancy, and ends, so often, by doing nothing. Smoke is the attack, bitter yet sympathetic, of a man who, with growing despair, has watched the weakness of his countrymen, while he loves his country all the more for the bitterness their sins have brought upon it.

More books from anboco

Cover of the book The Unbidden Guest by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book The Works by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book Nuggets in the Devil's Punch Bowl and Other Austrhe Bush; Thunder-and-Lightning by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book The Gunroom by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book Tubal Cain by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book Myths of Greece and Rome by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book Jane Eyre: An Autobiography by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book The Shepheard's Calender: Twelve Aeglogues Proportional to the Twelve Monethes by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book A Lear of the Steppes by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book The New Forest, Its History and its Scenery by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book Shakespeare, Bacon, and the Great Unknown by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book Historical Record of the Seventeenth or The Lts Formation in 1688 to 1848 by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book The Royal Pastime of Cock-fighting - The art ighting, and curing cocks of the game by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Cover of the book The Arts and Crafts of Ancient Egypt by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy