Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev
Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev (Cyrillic: Иван Сергеевич Тургенев) was a novelist, poet, and dramatist, and now ranks as one of the towering figures of Russian literature. His major works include the short-story collection A Sportsman’s Sketches (1852) and the novels Rudin (1856), Home of the Gentry (1859), On the Eve (1860), and Fathers and Sons (1862).
These works offer realistic, affectionate portrayals of the Russian peasantry and penetrating studies of the Russian intelligentsia who were attempting to move the country into a new age. His masterpiece, Fathers and Sons, is considered one of the greatest novels of the nineteenth century.
Turgenev was a contemporary with Fyodor Dostoevsky and Leo Tolstoy. While these wrote about church and religion, Turgenev was more concerned with the movement toward social reform in Russia.
“As we all know, time sometimes flies like a bird, and sometimescrawls like a worm, but people may be unusually happy when they do noteven notice whether time has passed quickly or slowly”
“the deep, pure blue stirs on one’s lips a smile, innocent as itself; like the clouds over the sky, and, as it were, with them, happy memories pass in slow procession over the soul”
“Whereas I think: I’m lying here in a haystack... The tiny space I occupy is so infinitesimal in comparison with the rest of space, which I don’t occupy and which has no relation to me. And the period of time in which I’m fated to live is so insignificant beside the eternity in which I haven’t existed and won’t exist... And yet in this atom, this mathematical point, blood is circulating, a brain is working, desiring something... What chaos! What a farce!”
“Aceeași viață aici curgea neauzită, ca și apa printre ierburile mlaștinii. Și pînă seara tîrziu Lavrețki nu se putu smulge din contemplarea acestei vieți trecătoare, ca apa care curge.Durerile trecutului se topeau în sufletu-i ca zăpezile primăvara și - lucru ciudat ! - niciodată nu simți o iubire așa adîncă și de puternică pentru pămîntul patriei sale.”
“Fathers and SonsArkaday watching Katya's face as she accepts his marriage proposal:Anyone who has never seen such tears in the eyes of a beloved one cannot fathom to what extent, all overcome with gratitude and shame, a human being can be happy on earth.Bazarov on his death bed:I am done for. I've fallen under the wheel. And it transpires that there was no point in thinking about the future. It's an old story, is death, but to every man it comes anew.”