The cycle of stories “Notes of a Hunter” by Turgenev was published in 1847 – 1851 in the Sovremennik magazine. The book was published as a separate edition in 1852. The main character of the collection, on whose behalf the story is told, is a young gentleman, hunter Pyotr Petrovich, he travels to nearby villages and retells his impressions about the life of Russian landowners, peasants, and describes the picturesque nature.
Main characters
Pyotr Petrovich (narrator)- young master, hunter, main character collection, the story is narrated on his behalf. He travels to nearby villages and retells his impressions about the life of Russian landowners and peasants, and describes the picturesque nature.
Ermolai- a hunter, a “carefree and good-natured” man of 45 years old, who belonged to Pyotr Petrovich’s neighbor, “a landowner of the old style.” He delivered grouse and partridges to the master's kitchen, hunted with the narrator; was married, but treated his wife rudely.
Khor and Kalinich
The narrator meets a hunter - a small Kaluga landowner Polutykin. On the way to Polutykin, they stop by a peasant landowner, Khor, who has been living with his children in a lonely estate in the forest for 25 years. The next day, while hunting, the narrator meets another man of Polutykin and Khor’s friend, Kalinich. The narrator spends three days with the rationalist Khor, comparing him with the dreamy Kalinich. Kalinich kept an apiary, got along with animals, “stood closer to nature,” while Khor was “toward people, to society.”
Ermolai and the miller's wife
The narrator went with the hunter Ermolai on a night hunt. Ermolai was a 45-year-old man who belonged to the narrator’s neighbor - “a landowner of the old style.” A man delivered grouse and partridges to the master's kitchen. Ermolai was married, but treated his wife rudely. The hunters decided to spend the night in the mill. When the men were sitting by the fire, the miller's wife Arina came to them. Ermolai invited her to visit him, promising to kick his wife out. The narrator recognized the miller's wife as a girl whom the master had once taken from her family and taken to St. Petersburg to serve as his servant. Arina said that the miller bought her.
Raspberry water
On a hot day, while hunting, the narrator went down to the Raspberry Water spring. Not far away, by the river, he saw two old men - Shumikhin’s Stepushka, a poor rootless man, and Mikhail Savelyev, nicknamed Fog. The narrator met Stepushka at the gardener Mitrofan's. The narrator joined the men. Fog remembered his late count, who loved to organize holidays. A man, Vlas, who approached them, said that he had gone to Moscow to see the master so that he could reduce his rent, but the master refused. The quitrent must be paid, but Vlas has nothing, and his hungry wife is waiting for him at home.
County doctor
One autumn the narrator fell ill - a fever caught him in a hotel in a provincial town. The doctor prescribed him treatment. The men started talking. The doctor told how he treated a girl of about twenty, Alexandra Andreevna, for a fatal illness. The girl did not recover for a long time and during this time mutual sympathy arose between them. Before her death, Alexandra told her mother that they were engaged. After some time, the doctor married a merchant's daughter.
My neighbor Radilov
Once, while hunting partridges with Ermolai, the narrator discovered an abandoned garden. Its owner turned out to be the landowner Radilov, the narrator’s neighbor. He invited the hunters to dine. The owner introduced the guests to his mother, the former landowner Fyodor Mikheich, the sister of his late wife Olya. At dinner, the narrator could not “discover a passion” for anything in his neighbor. Over tea, the owner recalled his wife’s funeral; how he lay in a Turkish hospital with a rotten fever. The narrator noted that any misfortune can be endured. A week later, the narrator learned that Radilov had gone somewhere with his sister-in-law, leaving his mother.
Odnodvorets Ovsyannikov
Luka Petrovich Ovsyannikov – full A tall man 70 years old. He reminded the narrator of “Russian boyars of pre-Petrine times.” He lived with his wife and did not pretend to be a nobleman or landowner. The narrator met him at Radilov's. During the conversation, Ovsyannikov recalled the past, the narrator’s grandfather - how he took a wedge of land from them; how I was in Moscow and saw the nobles there. Odnodvorets noted that now the nobles, although they have “learned all the sciences,” but “don’t understand the affairs of the present.”
Lgov
Once Ermolai suggested that the narrator go to Lgov, a large steppe village on a swampy river. A local hunter, Vladimir, a freed servant, joined them to help. He knew how to read and write, studied music, and expressed himself elegantly. To get the boat, Vladimir went to Suchok, the master’s fisherman. Suchok said that he managed to work for various gentlemen as a coachman, a cook, a coffee shop worker, an actor, a Cossack woman, and a gardener. The men went out to hunt ducks. The boat began to leak a little and at some point capsized. Ermolai found a ford and soon they were warming up in the hay barn.
Bezhin meadow
The narrator was returning from hunting in the evening and got lost in the twilight. Suddenly he came to a “huge plain” called “Bezhin Meadow”. Peasant children sat near two fires, guarding a herd of horses. The narrator joined them. The boys told stories about the brownie, the mermaid, the goblin, the late master, beliefs about parents' Saturday, and others folk tales about "evil spirits". Pavlusha went to get water, and when he returned he said that it seemed to him as if the drowned man was calling him from under the water. That same year, the boy was killed by falling from a horse.
Kasyan with a Beautiful Sword
The narrator and his coachman were returning from hunting when they met a funeral train - they were burying Martyn the carpenter. The narrator's cart broke down, they somehow got to the nearest settlements. Here the narrator met the holy fool Kasyan, a “dwarf of about fifty” nicknamed Blokha. Kasyan gave him his cart, and then went hunting with the narrator.
Seeing that the narrator was shooting birds for fun, Blokha said that “it is a great sin to show blood to the world.” Kasyan himself was engaged in catching nightingales and treating them with herbs. The coachman said that Blokha sheltered the orphan Annushka.
Mayor
The narrator is visiting the young landowner Arkady Pavlych Penochkin. Penochkin had a good education, was known as an enviable groom, he was “strict, but fair” with his subjects. However, the narrator visited him reluctantly. The men go to the village of Penochkin Shipilovka. The mayor Sofron Yakovlich was in charge of everything there. At first glance, things in the village were going well. However, the mayor, without the knowledge of the landowner, traded land and horses, abused the peasants, and was the actual owner of the village.
Office
To escape the rain, the narrator stopped in the nearest village, in the “main master's office.” He was told that this was the estate of Mrs. Losnyakova Elena Nikolaevna, 7 people work in the office, and the lady herself manages everything. By chance, the narrator overheard a conversation - the merchants pay the chief clerk Nikolai Eremeich before concluding a deal with the lady herself. Eremeich, in order to take revenge on the paramedic Pavsh for unsuccessful treatment, forbade Pavel’s fiancée Tatyana to get married. After a while, the narrator learned that the lady had exiled Tatyana.
Biryuk
The narrator is caught in the forest by a severe thunderstorm. He decides to wait out the bad weather, but a local forester comes up and takes him to his house. Forester Foma, nicknamed Biryuk, lived with his twelve-year-old daughter in a small hut. The forester's wife ran away with the tradesman long ago, leaving him with two children. When the rain stopped, Biryuk followed the sound of the ax and caught the thief who was chopping down the forest. The thief turned out to be a poor man. He first asked to be released, and then began to scold Biryuk, calling him a “beast.” The narrator was going to protect the poor man, but Biryuk, although angry, let the thief go.
Two landowners
The narrator introduces readers to two landowners with whom he often hunted. “Retired Major General Vyacheslav Illarionovich Khvalynsky” is a man “in adulthood, in his prime,” kind, but cannot treat poor and unofficial nobles as equals and a bad master, reputed to be a miser; loves women very much, but is not married.
Mardarii Apollonych Stegunov is his complete opposite - “a hospitable man and a buffoon”, lives in the old way. The peasants, although the master punished them, believed that he was doing everything right and such a master as theirs “you wouldn’t find in the whole province.”
Lebedyan
About five years ago the narrator found himself in Lebedyan “at the very collapse of the fair.” After lunch, I found young Prince N. in a coffee shop with retired lieutenant Khlopakov. Khlopakov knew how to live off his rich friends.
The narrator went to see the horses at the horse dealer Sitnikov. He offered horses at too high a price, and when Prince N. arrived, he completely forgot about the narrator. The narrator went to the famous breeder Chernobay. The breeder praised his horses, but sold the narrator a “scorched and lame” horse, and then did not want to take it back.
Tatyana Borisovna and her nephew
Tatyana Borisovna is a woman in her 50s, a free-thinking widow. She lives constantly on her small estate and rarely hangs out with other landowners. About 8 years ago I gave shelter to the son of my late brother Andryusha, who loved to draw. The woman’s acquaintance, college adviser Benevolensky, who “burned with a passion for art,” without knowing anything about it, took the talented boy to St. Petersburg. After the death of his patron, Andryusha returned to his aunt. He has completely changed, lives on his aunt’s means, says that he is a talented artist, but is not going to St. Petersburg again.
Death
The narrator goes to the forest cutting site with his neighbor Ardalion Mikhailovich. One of the men was crushed to death by a tree. After what he saw, the narrator thought that the Russian man “dies as if he were performing a ritual: coldly and simply.” The narrator recalled how another neighbor of his “in the village, a man was burned in a barn.” How a man in a village hospital, having learned that he might die, went home to give the last orders about the housework. I remembered the last days of my student friend Avenil Sorokoumov. I remembered how the landowner was dying and tried to pay the priest “for her waste.”
Singers
The narrator, escaping the heat, enters the Prytynny tavern, which belonged to Nikolai Ivanovich. The narrator witnesses a singing competition between “the best singer in the neighborhood,” Yashka the Turk, and a rower. The rower sang a dance song, and those present sang along with him. Yashka performed a mournful song, and “a Russian, truthful, ardent soul sounded and breathed in him.” The narrator's eyes welled up with tears. Yashka won the competition. The narrator, so as not to spoil the impression, left. The tavern's visitors celebrated Yashka's victory until late at night.
Petr Petrovich Karataev
Five years ago, the narrator, staying at a post house, met a small nobleman, Pyotr Petrovich Karataev. He went to Moscow to serve and shared his story. The man fell in love with the serf Matryona and wanted to ransom her, but the lady refused. Karataev stole Matryona. But one day, to “show off,” Matryona went to the lady’s village and ran into the master’s cart. They recognized the girl and wrote a complaint against Karataev. To pay off, he went into debt. Feeling sorry for Peter, Matryona herself returned to the master. A year later, the narrator met Karataev in Moscow in a billiard room. He sold the village and looked disappointed in life.
Date
The narrator fell asleep in a birch grove, hiding in the shade of the trees. When I woke up, I saw a young peasant girl Akulina sitting nearby. The “spoiled” valet of a rich master, Viktor Alexandrych, came to her. The valet said he was leaving tomorrow, so they wouldn't see each other next year. The girl burst into tears, but Victor treated her indifferently. When the valet left, the narrator wanted to console the girl, but she ran away in fear.
Hamlet of Shchigrovsky district
During one of the trips, the narrator spent the night with the landowner and hunter Alexander Mikhailych G***. The narrator could not sleep and his roommate told him his story. He was born in the Kursk province, then entered the university and joined a circle. At the age of 21 he went to Berlin, fell in love with the daughter of a professor he knew, but ran away. He wandered around Europe for two years and returned to his village. He married the daughter of a widowed neighbor. Having been widowed, he served in the provincial town. Now I realized that he was an unoriginal and insignificant person. Instead of introducing himself, he told the narrator to call him “Hamlet of the Shchigrovsky district.”
Tchertophanov and Nedolyuskin
Returning from a hunt, the narrator met two friends - Pantel Eremeich Tchertopkhanov and Tikhon Ivanovich Nedolyuskin. Nedolyuskin lived with Tchertopkhanov. Panteley was known as a proud man, a bully, and did not communicate with his fellow villagers.
Nedolyuskin’s father, after serving in the army, achieved nobility and gave his son a job as an official in the chancellery. After his death, the lazy and gentle Tikhon served as a majordomo, a parasite, and a half-butler, half-jester.
The lady bequeathed the village to Nedolyuskin. The men became friends when Tchertop-hanov saved him from the bullying of the other heirs of the lady.
The end of Tchertopkhanov
Tchertopkhanov was abandoned by his beloved Masha two years ago. As soon as he survived this, Nedolyuskin died. Tchertopkhanov sold the estate he inherited from a friend and ordered a beautiful statue for Nedolyuskin’s grave. Once Tchertop-hanov saw men beating a Jew. For his salvation, the Jew gave him a horse, but Panteleimon promised to pay 250 rubles for it. Patelemon got used to the horse, calling him Malek-Adele, but the animal was stolen. Tchertop-hanov spent a year traveling in search of a horse. He returned with the horse, but they gave him arguments that it was not Malek-Adel. Panteleimon let the horse go into the forest, but it returned. Then Tchertopkhanov shot the animal, and then drank for a whole week and died.
Living relics
In rainy weather, Ermolai and the narrator stopped at the farm of the narrator’s mother. In the morning, in the apiary, the narrator was called by Lukerya, a woman 28–29 years old, a former beauty who now looked like a mummy. About 6-7 years ago she accidentally fell and after that she began to dry out and wither away. The narrator offered to take her to the hospital, but the woman refused. Lukerya recounted her dreams to Pyotr Petrovich: in one, she dreamed that “Christ himself” came to meet her, calling her his bride; and in the other, her own death, which did not want to take her.
From the farm foreman, the narrator learned that Lukerya is called “Living Relics.” A few weeks later the woman died.
Knocking
The narrator and the peasant Filofey were traveling to Tula to buy some shot. On the way, the cart fell into the river - the conductor dozed off. After they got out of the water, the narrator fell asleep and woke up to the sound of the cart and the clatter of hooves. Felofei with the words: “It’s knocking!” , said that these were robbers. Soon they were overtaken by drunken men, one of them ran up to the narrator’s cart, asked for money for his hangover, and the company left. The narrator saw a cart of men in Tula near a tavern. Afterwards, Ermolai said that on the night of their trip, a merchant was robbed and killed on the same road.
Forest and steppe
The narrator reflects that “hunting with a gun and a dog is beautiful in itself.” Describes the beauty of nature at dawn, the view that opens before the hunter, how “pleasant it is to wander through the bushes at dawn.” How gradually it becomes hot. Having descended to the bottom of the ravine, the hunter quenches his thirst with water from the spring, and then rests in the shade of the trees. Suddenly a thunderstorm begins, after which “it smells like strawberries and mushrooms.” Evening comes, the sun sets, the hunter returns home. Both the forest and the steppe are good at any time of the year. "But it's time to end<…>In spring it’s easy to part ways, in spring even the happy are drawn into the distance...”
Conclusion
In the collection of stories “Notes of a Hunter,” Turgenev depicts simple Russian serfs, showing their high moral and ethical qualities. The author exposes the moral impoverishment of Russian landowners, leading to the idea of protest against serfdom. After the abolition of serfdom in Russia, Alexander II asked Turgenev to be told that the essays had played big role when making his decision to free the peasants.
We recommend not limiting yourself to reading brief retelling“Notes of a Hunter”, and evaluate the cycle of stories by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev in its entirety.
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The Russian people are original, not everyone understands the traditions and beliefs, but there is an understanding that each nation has its own characteristics. And when you learn more about them, you begin to love your homeland even more. Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev in the book “Notes of a Hunter” perfectly depicted the Russian people with their unique soul and characteristics. The writer spent the summer and autumn of 1846 in the Oryol province, where he often went hunting and communicated a lot with people. He wrote little then, but he learned a lot of interesting and curious things, which he later talked about in “Notes of a Hunter.”
Each of the stories is beautiful in its own way and has its own value. They are different in plot, show different heroes with their life problems, stories, destinies. And at the same time, there is a common depth in them, there is an understanding of how wise a person can be, how well he feels the world, nature.
The writer shows how ordinary people live: serfs, courtyards and small landowners. They are also familiar with love, loss, compassion, the desire to be happy and self-sacrifice. Listening to the story of each of them, you are imbued with sympathy and feel a special atmosphere.
Turgenev writes a lot about nature, which he sincerely loves, noticing the slightest changes. The unity of man and nature is especially noticeable when people feel changes and see signs in them. Reading feels like being transported to another amazing world and you study it carefully and with curiosity, feeling your soul become warmer.
On our website you can download the book “Notes of a Hunter” by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev for free and without registration in fb2, pdf, epub, txt format, read the book online or buy the book in the online store.
I have a neighbor, a young owner and a young hunter. One fine July morning I went to see him on horseback with a proposal to go black grouse hunting together. He agreed. “Just,” he says, “let’s go to see my little things, to Zusha; By the way, I’ll watch Chaplygino; do you know my oak forest? I’m having it cut down.” - “Let’s go.” He ordered the horse to be saddled, put on a green frock coat with bronze buttons depicting boars' heads, a game bag embroidered with garus, a silver flask, threw a brand new French gun on his shoulder, turned around in front of the mirror, not without pleasure, and called his dog Esperance, given to him by his cousin, an old maid with an excellent heart, but without hair. We went. My neighbor took with him the tenth Arkhip, a fat and squat man with a square face and antediluvian developed cheekbones, and a recently hired manager from the Baltic provinces, a young man of about nineteen, thin, blond, slightly blind, with drooping shoulders and a long neck, Mr. Gottlieb von- der-Koka. My neighbor himself recently took possession of the estate. He inherited it from his aunt, State Councilor Kardoi-Katayeva, an unusually fat woman who, even lying in bed, moaned pitifully for a long time. We entered the "little things". “Wait for me here in the clearing,” said Ardalion Mikhailych (my neighbor), turning to his companions. The German bowed, got off his horse, took a book out of his pocket, it seemed a novel by Johanna Schopenhauer, and sat down under a bush; Arkhip remained in the sun and did not move for an hour. We circled the bushes and did not find a single brood. Ardalion Mikhailych announced that he intended to go into the forest. That day I myself couldn’t believe in the success of the hunt: I also trudged after him. We returned to the clearing. The German noticed the page, stood up, put the book in his pocket and sat down, not without difficulty, on his scanty, defective mare, which squealed and kicked at the slightest touch; Arkhip perked up, jerked both reins at once, swung his legs and finally moved his stunned and crushed horse from its place. We went.
The forest of Ardalion Mikhailych was familiar to me from childhood. Together with my French tutor Mr. Désiré Fleury, kindest person(who, however, almost ruined my health forever, forcing me to drink Leroy’s medicine in the evenings), I often went to Chaplygino. This entire forest consisted of some two or three hundred huge oak and ash trees. Their stately, mighty trunks gleamed magnificently against the golden-transparent green of hazel and rowan trees; rising higher, they showed themselves harmoniously on clear azure and there they were already spreading their wide, knotty branches like a tent; Hawks, falcons, kestrels whistled over the motionless treetops, pileated woodpeckers pounded hard on the thick bark; the sonorous song of the blackbird suddenly rang out through the dense foliage, following the iridescent cry of the oriole; below, in the bushes, robins, siskins and warblers chirped and sang; finches ran nimbly along the paths; the hare crept along the edge of the forest, carefully “crutching”; a red-brown squirrel briskly jumped from tree to tree and suddenly sat down, raising its tail above its head. In the grass, near the tall anthills, under the light shadow of the beautiful carved fern leaves, violets and lilies of the valley bloomed, russula, capillary, milk mushrooms, oak mushrooms, and red fly agarics grew; on the lawns, between the wide bushes, there were red strawberries... And what a shadow there was in the forest! In the heat of the day, at noon, it’s a real night: silence, smell, freshness... I had a fun time in Chaplygin, and that’s why, I admit, it was not without a sad feeling that I now entered the forest that was too familiar to me.
Books, like people, are different. It happens that you pick up a book, open it and start reading, line by line, you can’t stop, and a whole era opens up before you. With such books there are no historical references, documentaries, newspapers or reference books cannot compare. Pictures of nature and life, the main characters, their relationships - everything is literally imbued with the spirit of the times. Such works include Turgenev’s series of stories “Notes of a Hunter.”
When you start reading Ivan Turgenev’s “Notes of a Hunter,” you understand that the story “Khor and Kalinich” opens the collection and at the same time becomes the spiritual core of the entire series devoted to the topic of serfdom. Khor and Kalinich are two friends, two peasant characters, completely different from each other, but it is they who represent the true forces of the nation, which are ready to grow and develop. But there is one obstacle - serfdom. It is not only the common people who suffer from its harmful influence. Permissiveness and moral corruption of the nobility is another terrible consequence, the second link of one chain - serfdom, which has already taken the form of a national evil. This is exactly what the author is talking about, and his lyrical hero is a hunter who takes on a different appearance from story to story. Either he is a passionate hunter, as in the story “Bezhin Meadow”, then he is a simple wanderer - an outside observer, as in the story “Biryuk”, then his noble origin is also revealed. One thing does not change - its inner content: nobility, honesty, love of life, and, of course, love for Russian nature. In general, nature is another central character in the “Notes of a Hunter” series. In Turgenev's view, she is a real element, living according to her own laws, which are not always clear to us, mysterious and frightening. But at the same time, nature and man are two inseparable parts of each other.
You can download Turgenev’s book “Notes of a Hunter” in its entirety for free on our website. You can study the text online without registration.
“Notes of a Hunter” - a collection of 25 relatively short stories. Most of them were written by I. S. Turgenev at the turn of the 1840-1850s. Here he talks about meetings with people during hunting wanderings in his native Oryol region and what he heard from their lips.
Turgenev “Khor and Kalinich” - summary
Turgenev describes in this essay two serfs of the landowner Polutykin - two people of completely different types. The practical, economical, prudent hoarder Khorya is opposed by the rural romantic dreamer Kalinich, who throughout his life has never found a reliable corner for himself. Despite such strong differences, they have great friendship with each other. The author, with subtle observation, depicts the merits of both characters - universal human types that are well known to everyone.
Khor and Kalinich. Audiobook
Turgenev “Ermolai and the miller’s wife” - summary
Turgenev introduces the reader to his frequent hunting companion - the tramp Ermolai. During one of their joint overnight stays at the mill, Ermolai’s acquaintance, the miller’s wife Arina, comes to the fire at night. After talking with her, the writer realizes that she is the former maid of the landowner Zverkov, whose story he had heard about before. Zverkov’s wife kept only unmarried maids, believing that taking care of children would prevent married ones from “properly caring for their mistress.” Arina fell in love with Petrushka the footman and became pregnant by him. The Zverkovs drove her out to the village in disgrace, separating her from Petrushka. Out of grief, he voluntarily became a soldier, and Arina had to marry an unloved miller.
the full text of the story “Ermolai and the Miller’s Wife” and its summary.
I. S. Turgenev. Ermolai and the miller's wife. Audiobook
Turgenev “Raspberry Water” - summary
Tired of hunting, Turgenev sits down to rest at a spring on the banks of the Ista River, which is called “Raspberry Water.” Here he meets two familiar peasants. One of them - old man Mikhailo Savelyev, former butler of the famous Count Pyotr Ilyich in the area - tells what expensive and noisy festivities with music and fireworks he organized “in the old days” for his noble guests. In the middle of the story, an elderly man, Vlas, suddenly approaches Raspberry Water. It turns out that he is walking from Moscow, where he asked his master, the son of that same Pyotr Ilyich, to reduce his rent due to the death of his breadwinner-son. The master rudely drove Vlas away.
On our website you can read the full text of the story “Raspberry Water” and its summary.
I. S. Turgenev. Raspberry water. Audiobook
Turgenev “County Doctor” - summary
The district doctor tells Turgenev at the hotel about a strange incident. One day he was called to a provincial estate, to a young, beautiful girl Alexandra, who fell ill with a fever. The doctor spent several days at the patient’s bedside, initially hoping for her recovery, but then realizing that she would die. The patient herself guessed this. In desperate grief that she would have to go to her grave without experiencing love, Alexandra turned the full force of her never-shared passion on the awkward doctor - the only man who was now nearby. For her, this was the last dying consolation...
On our website you can read the full text of the story “The District Doctor”.
Turgenev “My neighbor Radilov” - summary
While hunting, Turgenev and Ermolai accidentally enter the garden of the landowner Radilov and meet him himself. Hospitable and friendly Radilov invites them to his house for dinner, introduces them to his old mother, to the degraded hanger-on Fyodor Mikheich, to his wife’s serious and beautiful sister Olga. He tries to entertain the guests, but Turgenev notices a sign of some kind of heavy thought in the expression of his new acquaintance. From the conversation it accidentally turns out that Radilov’s beloved wife recently died and this loss shocked him terribly. Comforting Radilov, Turgenev expresses the hope that some turn of fate will bring him out of grief. Suddenly perking up, Radilov hits the table with his hand and says: “Yes, you just have to make up your mind.” Turgenev soon learns that Radilov suddenly left unknown where with Olga, leaving the estate and his mother.
On our website you can read the full text of the story “My Neighbor Radilov”.
Turgenev “Ovsyannikov’s One-Palace” - summary
An elderly man of the same estate (a petty nobleman - “semi-peasant”) Ovsyannikov is reputed to be an intelligent and sedate man. Turgenev loves to talk with him, especially interested in comparing modern times with the previous, Catherine, era. Ovsyannikov believes that before there was more arbitrariness and tyranny, but life flowed calmer and more thoroughly. Now among the nobles there are many who like to talk about “humanism” and “advanced ideas” - but without a clue how to apply them to practical life. “They speak so smoothly that the soul is touched, but they don’t understand the realities of the present, they don’t even feel their own benefit.” They are rushing around with projects for “building factories on the site of drained swamps,” which in reality they don’t even think about taking up. Rich "liberals" refuse to give up a piece of their land on common benefit. Hired litigators are proliferating, initiating false legal cases. Among them is Ovsyannikov’s own nephew, Mitya.
On our website you can read the full text of the story “Ovsyannikov’s One-Palace”.
Turgenev “Lgov” - summary
Turgenev and Ermolai go hunting in the village of Lgov, where there is a large pond with many ducks. There they meet two funny and colorful characters. One is the former serf Vladimir, who previously studied music with the landowner and served as a valet, then received his freedom and now behaves like a man of refined manners. The other is the sixty-year-old peasant Suchok, who has changed many bar owners during his life and was used by them for a variety of needs. Suchok was a cook, a “coffee shop”, a coachman, and an actor in the landowner’s theater. Now he is appointed as a “fisherman” on the pond with the responsibility of maintaining a boarding boat. Turgenev, Ermolai, Vladimir and Suchok sail on this boat for game, but in the midst of shooting at ducks, it sinks. The unlucky hunters barely make it to the shore along the ford found by Ermolai.
