The fifties became, in a sense, revolutionary eras in the 19th and 20th centuries. In the last century, a change in the rhythm of life, a new art, a technical and scientific breakthrough provoked a generational conflict. It seemed to youth that everything would be different now, humanity would live differently, and conservatively “ancestors” objected to them: “Everything will return to normal, and no satellites and reactors with computers can change people.”
Chemists or poets? Physicists or lyrics?
Approximately the same mood was in the air of the XIX century. Ivan Turgenev wrote his wonderful novel in the 60s, but it takes place a little earlier, on the eve of the abolition of serfdom. The nihilist, materialist and cynic Evgeny Bazarov became the bearer of the generational conflict. Fathers and children in a literary work are not represented as relatives. The representative of the older generation and admirer of the patriarchal aristocratic way of life Pavel Petrovich Kirsanov argues with the young rebel in the same way that the youth of the “thaw” entered into ideological disputes in the middle of the 20th century.
Who is more important, who is needed, physicists or lyrics? Debates on this subject worried people in the Soviet Union. “A chemist is more useful than a poet,” says the Turgenev character, the son of a doctor, Bazarov, at the end of the 1950s. “Fathers and Sons” is a novel about the eternal dispute between materialists and idealists, with its heroes holding extremely opposite views.
Conservatism and liberalism
Kirsanov idealizes the role of the aristocracy and the “principles”, without which life is impossible, and his young opponent protests ardently and sharply. He believes that you need to "clear" the place for new social relations, and this can only be done by destroying the old world "to the foundation, and then ...". It is unlikely that he read the works of Marx, at least there is no mention of this in the novel, but their general spirit, albeit in a simplified-schematic form, is declared by Bazarov. “Fathers and Sons” is a novel, a work of art that reflects the movement of Russian social thought in a liberal direction.
Disputes about a man
Interesting debates about Narodism, which are the heroes of the novel "Fathers and Sons." Evgeny Bazarov seems to have a deeper knowledge of peasant life, his grandfather even plowed the land. He quite reasonably reproaches Pavel Petrovich Kirsanov for his inability to organize agricultural production, and at the same time for inactivity. All this is true, only the trouble is, the peasants this subverter of the foundations despises for ignorance. Those answer him with an equal coin, they consider him a pea jester. In fact, Kirsanov and Bazarov have a very distant idea of the life of the common people. Fathers and children are equally captive of their own illusions on this issue.
And what about love?
Both conflicting characters are subject to wonderful feelings. The materialist pays tribute to the external attractiveness of Fenechka, he likes her, but the meeting with Anna Sergeyevna Odintsova makes one look at love not just as a manifestation of the rational instinct of reproduction. Pavel Petrovich loves differently; he does not analyze his own feelings. Princess R. is his deity, but this novel ends tragically, she dies. Parting with Odintsova and Bazarov. Fathers and Sons is a book about unhappy love.
The attitude of the author to his characters
Sympathy of the author is on the side of Kirsanov, this is felt by every reader of the novel "Fathers and Sons." The image of Bazarov causes subconscious rejection, despite the fact that it is difficult to disagree with some of his arguments. However, Pavel Petrovich is by no means portrayed as an ideal protagonist, he has flaws. And the writer disposed of his characters, one “killed”, the other sent abroad.
Apparently, Turgenev wanted to see other heroes, and not only on the pages of books, but also in life.