SOURCE: Woodward, James B. “Determinism in the Novels of Turgenev.” Scando-Slavica 34 (1988): 17-27.

In the following essay, Woodward discusses Turgenev's consistent treatment in his novels of characters who are powerless and unable to direct their own lives.

The essential impotence of man is the most basic and consistent theme of Turgenev's fiction. In the works of no other major Russian writer is the individual portrayed as so limited by the very nature of his being in his freedom of choice, in the opportunities allowed him to shape his own destiny. He is perpetually prey to the influence of “forces” which he is usually powerless to resist or comprehend. Thus the hero of the story “Son” describes a typical experience: “Only then did I realise that from morning onwards I had been led by unknown forces, that I was in their power, and for several moments there was nothing in...