Explorations Read-Aloud: “Fathers and Sons” by Ivan Turgenev

Every Friday, at 11:00 am, on the library’s YouTube Channel and Facebook Page, the library will stream a brand new recording of local thespian, Joseph Coté reading aloud selections from a wide variety of fascinating and entertaining books of fiction and non-fiction.

For October 10, Coté will read aloud from Ivan Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons.

Fathers and Sons is Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev’s masterpiece novel written in the mid-19th century.

The work delves into the generational conflicts between fathers and their sons, particularly through the character Bazarov, who embodies the emerging idea of Nihilism in Russian society.

The story primarily focuses on Arkady Kirsanov, a newly graduated student, and his father, Nikolai Petrovitch Kirsanov, highlighting the tensions and differing ideologies between them. At the start of the novel, we are introduced to Nikolai Petrovitch as he waits for his son Arkady to return home from university, filled with excitement and nostalgia for his late wife.

When Arkady arrives home from college with his friend Bazarov, the dynamic shifts as Bazarov’s radical ideas challenge the older generation’s values. The opening characters set the stage for exploring themes of change, tradition, and social criticism through the interactions between these characters, establishing a rich context for the unfolding drama of generational differences and philosophical debates.

Quite controversial at the time of publication, Fathers and Sons concerns the inevitable conflict between the values of traditionalists and intellectuals.

The physician Bazarov, the novel’s protagonist, is the most powerful of Turgenev’s creations. He is a nihilist, denying the validity of all laws save those of the natural science. Uncouth and forthright in his opinions, he is nonetheless susceptible to love and by that fact doomed to unhappiness. In sociopolitical terms, he represents the victor of the revolutionary intelligentsia over the aristocracy, to which Turgenev belonged.

At the novel’s first appearance the radical younger generation attacked it bitterly as a slander, and conservatives condemned it as too lenient in its characterization of nihilism.

Click the links to find the library’s YouTube Channel and Facebook Page.

Thoughts to share? Book ideas to suggest?
Contact Joseph at friday-explorations@usa.net