Fathers And Sons

Sooooooo... Hard-hitting, morally deep, philosophical Russian novel. Yup, sounds pretty true to type so far. But (although I say this about pretty much every book) there was something different about it which made it thoroughly fascinating to read.

From what I could gather from my dad, who seems to know everything about every book ever, it's the first book of its kind to portray the new breed of "nihilists", who were just emerging in the new generation of Russians in the 1860s. The nihilists basically believed in nothing without explicit proof that it worked or existed. For example, one of the characters, Bazarov, who is a hardcore nihilist, is training to be a country doctor like his father, but when asked if he believes in medicine, he replies that he doesn't. His friend Arkady, on the other hand, professes to be a nihilist, but has romantic inclinations (a romantic was a thing desperately despised by the nihilists for their utter willingness to believe in poetry, music, etc.) meaning that his heart isn't really in it. There's an interesting conflict between Arkady's uncle, Pavel, and Bazarov on their beliefs, but I'll leave it to you to discover the outcome...!

The ultimate test of Bazarov's beliefs comes when he falls in love with Madame Odintzov, a wealthy aristocrat who inherited all of her money from her husband who is, conveniently, deceased. He can't quite accept that he's falling in love as it goes against all of his fundamental beliefs (or non-beliefs, as it may be). His inner conflict (cue Made In Chelsea voice) is incredibly interesting to watch as it starts to define him in a way he doesn't know how to accept.

Well, tres bon indeed, and I thoroughly recommend that you read ca livre! Next, staying with the family theme, I shall be embarking on Sons and Lovers, by D.H. Lawrence, my first Lawrence EVER, so very excited to see how it turns out...

P.S. The translation that I've got of Fathers and Sons was genuinely awful. It anglicized all the Russian names and made some sentences very very hard indeed to comprehend! My advice: don't go second-hand with this one, you're gonna need to get a Penguin Classics or Vintage Classics, they've got the best modern translations.