Critics of the novel Fathers and Sons. Roman I. S. Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons" in Criticism

Fathers and Sons, whose story is usually associated with the work Rudin, published in 1855, is a novel in which Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev returned to the structure of his first creation.

As in it, in “Fathers and Sons” all the plot threads came to the same center, which was formed by the figure of Bazarov, the democrat’s brother-in-law. She alarmed all critics and readers. Various critics wrote a lot about the novel Fathers and Sons, as the work aroused genuine interest and debate. The main positions in relation to this novel we will present to you in this article.

The significance of the image of Bazarov in understanding the work

Bazarov became not only the plot center of the work, but also problematic. The assessment of all the other sides of Turgenev’s novel depended on the understanding of his fate and personality: the author’s position, the character system, various artistic techniques used in the work “Fathers and Sons”. The critics examined the novel in chapters and saw in it a new twist in the work of Ivan Sergeyevich, although their understanding of the staged meaning of this work was completely different.

Why did they blame Turgenev?

The ambivalence of the author himself towards his hero entailed the censure and reproach of his contemporaries. Turgenev was brutally scolded from all sides. Critics of the novel Fathers and Sons responded mostly negatively. Many readers could not understand the author’s thought. From the memoirs of Annenkov, as well as Ivan Sergeyevich himself, we learn that M.N. Katkov became indignant after reading the manuscript "Fathers and Sons" in chapters. He was indignant that the protagonist of the work reigned supreme and did not meet with any effective resistance. Readers and critics of the opposite camp also brutally condemned Ivan Sergeyevich for the internal dispute that he led with Bazarov in his novel Fathers and Sons. Their content seemed to them not quite democratic.

The most notable among many other interpretations are the article by M.A. Antonovich, published in Sovremennik (Asmodeus of Our Time), as well as a number of articles that appeared in the journal Russian Word (democratic), by D.I. Pisareva: The Thinking Proletariat, Realists, Bazarov. These critics of Fathers and Sons presented two opposing opinions.

Opinion Pisarev about the main character

Unlike Antonovich, who evaluated Bazarov sharply negatively, Pisarev saw in him a real "hero of the time." This critic compared this image with the "new people" depicted in the novel "What to do?" N.G. Chernyshevsky.

The theme “fathers and children” (intergenerational relationship) in his articles came to the fore. Contradictory opinions expressed by representatives of the democratic direction about Turgenev ’s work were perceived as a “schism among nihilists” - a fact of internal polemics that existed in the democratic movement.

Antonovich about Bazarov

Both readers and critics of “Fathers and Sons” were not accidentally worried about two questions: about the author’s position and about prototypes of the images of this novel. They constitute the two poles by which any work is interpreted and perceived. According to Antonovich, Turgenev was malicious. In the interpretation of Bazarov, presented by this critic, this image is not at all written off "from nature" by a person, but by an "evil spirit", "asmodei", which was released by a writer embittered by a new generation.

An article by Antonovich is sustained in a feuilletonian manner. This critic, instead of presenting an objective analysis of the work, created a cartoon on the main character, substituting Sitnikov, the “student” of Bazarov, in the place of his teacher. Bazarov, according to Antonovich, is not at all an artistic generalization, not a mirror in which the younger generation is reflected . The critic believed that the author of the novel created a biting feuilleton, which should be objected in the same manner. The goal of Antonovich - to "quarrel" with the young generation of Turgenev - was achieved.

What could democrats not forgive Turgenev?

Antonovich, in the subtext of his unfair and rude article, reproached the author for having turned out to be a figure that is too "recognizable", since Dobrolyubov is considered one of its prototypes. Journalists of Sovremennik, in addition, could not forgive the author for breaking up with this journal. The novel Fathers and Sons was published in Russian Herald, a conservative publication, which was for them a sign of Ivan Sergeyevich’s final break with democracy.

Bazarov in "real criticism"

Pisarev expressed a different point of view regarding the protagonist of the work. He considered it not as a caricature of some individuals, but as a representative of a new social-ideological type that was taking shape at that time. This critic was least interested in the attitude of the author to his hero, as well as various features of the artistic embodiment of this image. Pisarev interpreted Bazarov in the spirit of so-called real criticism. He pointed out that the author was biased in his image, but the type itself was highly rated by Pisarev as a “hero of the time”. An article entitled "Bazarov" said that the protagonist depicted in the novel, presented as a "tragic face", is a new type that literature lacked. In further interpretations of this critic, Bazarov came off more and more from the novel itself. For example, in the articles “The Thinking Proletariat” and “Realists”, the name “Bazarov” was used to name the type of era, the cultural-tribe racer, who, according to the world outlook, was close to Pisarev himself.

Accusations of bias

The objective, calm tone of Turgenev in the image of the protagonist was contradicted by accusations of tendentiousness. “Fathers and Sons” is a kind of Turgenev’s “duel” with nihilists and nihilism, but the author complied with all the requirements of the “code of honor”: he respected the enemy, “killing” him in an honest battle. Bazarov as a symbol of dangerous misconceptions, according to Ivan Sergeyevich, is a worthy adversary. The mockery and caricature of the image, which some critics accused the author of, were not used to them, since they could give a completely opposite result, namely, underestimating the power of nihilism, which is destructive. The nihilists sought to put their false idols in the place of the "eternal." Turgenev, recalling his work on the image of Yevgeny Bazarov, wrote M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin in 1876 about the novel "Fathers and Sons", whose creation story was of interest to many, that he is not surprised at why this hero remained a mystery to the majority of readers, because the author himself cannot quite imagine how he wrote it. Turgenev said that he knew only one thing: there was then no tendency in him, no bias of thought.

The position of Turgenev himself

Critics of the novel Fathers and Sons responded mostly one-sidedly, giving sharp assessments. Meanwhile, Turgenev, as in his previous novels, avoids comment, does not draw conclusions, deliberately hides the inner world of his hero in order not to put pressure on readers. The conflict of the novel "Fathers and Sons" is by no means on the surface. The author’s position , so straightforwardly interpreted by the critic Antonovich and completely ignored by Pisarev, is manifested in the composition of the plot, in the nature of the conflicts. It is in them that the concept of Bazarov’s fate is presented, presented by the author of the work “Fathers and Sons”, the images of which still cause controversy among various researchers.

Eugene in disputes with Pavel Petrovich is unshakable, but after a difficult "test of love" is internally broken. The author emphasizes the "cruelty", the reasonableness of the beliefs of this hero, as well as the interconnectedness of all the components that make up his worldview. Bazarov is a maximalist, according to whom any conviction is valuable if it is not in conflict with others. It was worth this character to lose one "link" in the "chain" of worldview - all others were reevaluated and questioned. In the finale, this is the "new" Bazarov, which is the "Hamlet" among the nihilists.