Turgenev Plays

by Ivan Turgenev

This selection not only reveals the extent of Turgenev's achievement as a dramatist, but sheds an interesting light on the novels that followed. Includes: A Month in the Country, Stony Broke, One of the Family, Lunch at His Excellency's, A Provincial Day, and The Bachelor.

Genres: Russian Literature, Russia, Plays

386 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1924

About the author

Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev (Cyrillic: Иван Сергеевич Тургенев) was a novelist, poet, and dramatist, and now ranks as one of the towering figures of Russian literature. His major works include the short-story collection A Sportsman’s Sketches (1852) and the novels Rudin (1856), Home of the Gentry (1859), On the Eve (1860), and Fathers and Sons (1862).

These works offer realistic, affectionate portrayals of the Russian peasantry and penetrating studies of the Russian intelligentsia who were attempting to move the country into a new age. His masterpiece, Fathers and Sons, is considered one of the greatest novels of the nineteenth century.

Turgenev was a contemporary with Fyodor Dostoevsky and Leo Tolstoy. While these wrote about church and religion, Turgenev was more concerned with the movement toward social reform in Russia.

Reviews

[Steven R. Kraaijeveld · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite a somewhat poor translation, these plays were very good. Turgenev's genius is still not recognized widely enough, in my opinion (even with good old Hemingway calling him "the greatest writer there ever was"). If he is appreciated, it is usually for Fathers and Sons, and perhaps for First Love. Yet his entire oeuvre, or as much as I have read of it, is wonderful. He is so beautifully subtle at times. The fact that the best of his plays - A Month in the Country - precedes Chekhov's (much better known) plays by some 50 years is remarkable. Turgenev certainly exerted an influence on Chekhov. Perhaps it didn't help that Turgenev disparaged his own plays, calling them 'short stories in dramatic form' and unsuited to the stage. I think he was wrong in his self-assessment; the plays, perhaps slightly elaborate at times, belong to the theater. Incidentally, I found out that Pevear & Volokhonsky recently translated A Month in the Country. I ordered it and will re-read it in an English that I'm sure will do Turgenev greater justice.

[Elisa]

A Month in the Country mentioned in Lee Radziwill memoir, Happy Times, as being similar to the life she led at her French county house.