Home of the Gentry (Penguin Classics)

Already in his thirties, Lavretsky returns to his hometown of O... in Russia. He descends form a strange family of landed gentry. At some point in the book his biography is revealed, a life of reclusion, loneliness, and disappointment. Very Russian. Lavretsky returns a defeated man, for his wife has cheated on him in every corner, has taken lots of money from him, and disgraced him through half Europe. And everybody knows. After dismissing her, he travels to Italy, in order to get himself together, and he decides that his mission is Voltaire-like, to go back to Russia and "tender his own garden". He decides not to go back to the old estate where he had suffered so much, but to a smaller house where a wicked old aunt had died. Trying to recover some social links, he visits a distant relative, Maria Dimitrevna Kalitin, a widow with two young daughters. I won't spoil the rest, but what follows is a tale of mishap, love, suffering, unwelcome surprises. The epilogue is masterful, an ode to memory, to the passage of time, and to bodily-felt homesickness.Traditional, serene, and making no concessions, this novel is part of the work that makes Turgenev deserve his place up above with Tolstoi and Dostoevsky, in his own style. Russian to the bone, but without paranoid delirium or epic ambitions, it is a perfect novel. I would like to read it again when I am old, sitting on a bench of a park, in autumn.

If you enjoy Ivan Turgenev's storytelling, then this poignant novel is a must! One of Turgenev's more unsettling works, "Home of the Gentry" is a touching tale of life's harder side. The triumphs and travails of each character are described with poetic Turgenev flair. The mistakes and flaws of each character painfully haunt throughout this engrossing tale. I described this as one of Turgenev's more unsettling novels because of the endings to his life sketches for so many characters in the novel. Likewise, he wonderfully contrasts the difficulty of growing old, with the mistakes of your past front and center, against the yet unblemished grandeur of exuberant youth! He does it so well that I found it a bit personally unsettling. In short, this story powerfully resonates with the struggles of our own lives! A wonderful, feeling novel which I highly recommend. It is not, however, a classical fairy tale story! Nonetheless, it is arguably just as beautiful.

It is the archetypal story of the 'homecoming'. Turgenev captures the pathos and longing of returning. Where Tolstoy is the master of the epic, the great renouncer of sex and lust, Russia's prophet, Turgenev is the poet of landscapes, emotions, quiet moods and unfulfilled love. When you read Tolstoy, you can feel his brooding presence in the pages of his stories; with Turgenev, it is a bit more solemn, modest and melancholic. He is the wistful Russia, a thinker, a romantic. When the large tempos of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky overtake you, turn to Turgenev and appreciate his brief glimpses of beauty. First Love, On The Eve and A Month in the Country are also equally rewarding.

An exquisite gem of a novel. Henry James was right in his praise for this book, and you can also see why Flaubert was such a fan--and how much he was influenced by Turgenev. I should add that the translation is exceptional, far better than many of the clunky translations that detract from other Russian novels I've read (including Turgenev's "Torrents of Spring" in the Barnes and Noble edition). I expect to come back to this one again and again.

Beside the point. All those questions you ask are geared to sell and are, pardon me, quite stupid.

One of my favourite turGeneva novels. I read this thirty years ago and how wonderful the revisit has been.

The text has plenty of typos, exclamation points in the middle of words, and is a very poor translation.

A very hard to find Turganev novel. Everyone should read him. One of the best Russian writers of all time

An elegaic meditation on ageing, love and happiness, this has been called the most 'Turgenevian' of Turgenev's novels. It is set in the externally placid countryside, with the metropolises of Moscow and St Petersburg (and Paris) mentioned only as distant lands of troubles and bureaucracy.The novel is mainly concerned with Lavretsky, who has returned to the countryside following his wife's unfaithfulness. She has gone to Paris, and he has now fled back to the country, as if he has been scalded by life and has now scarpered from it like a whimpering dog - or perhaps it is more like a bird returning after migration, as the Russian title 'The Nobility's Nest' suggests. While he fully expects to pass the remainder of his days in seclusion, he falls in love with Liza and the torments of love and unattainable happiness assail him once again, as it conspires that the two of them are unable to be together for the wheel of fate has spun them away from one another.A Russian novel that if not epic in size, is certainly epic in its strength and beauty. It's concern with Russia's relationship with Europe is one that we can also find in War and Peace, and it's certainly no slander against Turgenev to say that this novel could easily find its place slipped within the pages of that epic masterpiece.

Brand new book, as expected. Great if you like his work, which I do.

Brilliante Novelle und "first class English" translation aus dem Russischen.

Love those Russians.

I loved the translation; it shows a racy story, precisely and colourfully written. Finished it in a couple of days.