And maybe my impression isn't accurate, but he fit into the slot between the Nikolay/Pavel and Bazarov characters. He helped break down what I initially hated about Bazarov, because we see his process of learning that he can't get to Bazarov's state. And he's still young, so his "spongeness" seems natural, rather than existing because simply he doesn't have a mind of his own.
True, he fills a valuable narrative slot, but I don't like him any more for that.
To be honest, I didn't get the sense at all that Katya was uninteresting. She was overshadowed by Anna, and Arkady got to "find" her, so to speak. Same way he learned not to take everything Bazarov said by rote. I do agree that Arkady was the thinking everyman, and I felt that that was what Turgenev thought a man should grow into.
I am intending to post something on Turgenev's women in this book, but for now let me say this: Katya follows the trend that "natural" women who stick to feelings rather than opinion and intellect are the more admirable mate. It bugs me. She has no personality of her own, apart from having hidden and being afraid of her more outspoken and organised sister (who has faults of her own, but still) -- Katya is a natural being who needs a man to find her, and I find I am getting slightly nauseated.
*MySmiley*
structured procrastinator
structured procrastinator
Russian Book Club: Fathers and Sons by Turgenev.
- 17/10/2010 01:39:16 AM
1095 Views
Bazarov
- 17/10/2010 02:12:03 PM
919 Views
*NM*
oh, and
- 17/10/2010 06:42:38 PM
812 Views
Re: oh, and
- 18/10/2010 12:09:10 AM
785 Views
Arkady
- 17/10/2010 02:15:54 PM
768 Views
Well, that makes sense
- 17/10/2010 05:12:09 PM
765 Views
Re: Well, that makes sense
- 18/10/2010 12:04:05 AM
774 Views
See, I liked Arkady
- 17/10/2010 06:08:57 PM
708 Views
Re: See, I liked Arkady
- 18/10/2010 12:13:49 AM
754 Views
Oh...Rebekah, I was going to mention that I saw your post only much later because I was very drunk.
- 17/10/2010 05:13:41 PM
794 Views
Good book.
- 17/10/2010 06:37:16 PM
820 Views
I loved it. Great book.
- 18/10/2010 10:49:27 PM
745 Views
I think it's very relevant. It's also unusually un-Russian.
- 18/10/2010 11:54:03 PM
713 Views
Yeah... the Russian nobility at the time seems to have been kind of un-Russian, really.
- 20/10/2010 04:03:34 PM
796 Views
It felt very Russian to me as well
- 20/10/2010 04:12:50 PM
718 Views
There was little of the usual ... histrionics that happen in Russian novels.
- 22/10/2010 07:02:12 PM
782 Views
I really wish I'd bought a properly annotated version.
- 22/10/2010 07:07:16 PM
820 Views
The answer to that is to just read a great book on Nineteenth Century Russian history.
- 22/10/2010 10:55:06 PM
794 Views
Not just Russian, though, there's a lot of mentions of other European history.
- 22/10/2010 11:19:28 PM
740 Views
Nikolai and Pavel - I love them.
- 22/10/2010 07:14:11 PM
903 Views
Perhaps it's Pavel's "The Chap"-ish nature that makes the novel seem less Russian to me.
- 22/10/2010 10:53:56 PM
866 Views