First Love - Ivan Turgenev

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Résumé :
First Love is a classic tale of romance by Russian author Ivan Turgenev, famous for its autobiographical overtones. Originally published in 1860, the story begins at a party in which three middle-aged men are each telling the tale of their first love. When our protagonist Vladimir Petrovich has his turn to tell his, he proposes to write it down in a notebook and read it. Herein we are told about Vladimir's sixteen year old self, who is staying with his family in the countryside, wherein he meets his new neighbour Zinaida Alexandrovna Zasyekina. Although the girl is five years his senior, the young Vladimir falls for her immediately. However the beautiful and mischievous Zinaida has other suitors, and many are better placed in life compared with the teenage Vladimir......

Biographie:
Ivan Turgenev was born on 9th November 1818 to noble and wealthy parents in Oryol, Russia. His father a Colonel in the Russian Cavalry and his mother came from the nobel Lutovinov house of the Oryol Governorate. Turgenev spent the majority of his younger life in Moscow with his two younger brothers, where he was brought up having a proper education. Turgenev started out university life at the university of Moscow in 1833, before moving to the University of St Petersburg to study Classic Russian Literature and philology between 1834 to 1837, it was during this time Turgenev started to write poetry. Whilst he was studying there he would lose his father to kidney stoney disease and his youngest brother to epilepsy.From 1838 to 1841, Turgenev studied philosophy and history at the university of Berlin before finishing his master in St Petersburg. Unable to get a professorship at St Petersburg University, Turgenev ventured into the world of politics and government where he spent two years between 1843 and 1845 at the Russian Ministry of Interior. Here he would continue to write poetry before venturing into play writing with 'The Rash Thing To Do', in 1843. Though he never married, Turgenev did have a love with the well renowned Spanish singer Pauline Viardot. Though this relationship would only be a platonic one, the two would become close friends exchanging letters with Viardot helping Turgenev later on in life. Turgenev was known to have many love affairs with his family servants, with one of these love affairs in 1842 leading to the birth of his illegitimate daughter Paulinette. Turgenev would later entrust his dear friend Viardot to bring-up his daughter Paulinette. Turgenev's writing career began in the 1840's, writing long poems before transitioning into plays, novels and short stories. Unlike a lot of writers of the time Turgenev's works shied away from the religious influences of the time and preferred to revolve his work around the political and social issues of Russia during the 1800's. This would come and haunt him when he wrote his greatest novel 'Father and Sons' in 1862, where it was given a hostile reaction by the Russian audience leading him to go into self-exile. This self-exile first sent Turgenev to Germany but at the outbreak of the Franco-German war in 1870, he moved to London and then Paris, where he would settle. Turgenev's final piece of word was a short story called 'The Mysterious tales' in 1883, later that year he would die at the age of 64 on the 3rd September 1883 in Bougival, France. His body was then transported back to St Petersburg where he was buried in Volkovo Cemetery....

Sommaire:
First Love is a classic tale of romance by Russian author Ivan Turgenev, famous for its autobiographical overtones. Originally published in 1860, the story begins at a party in which three middle-aged men are each telling the tale of their first love. When our protagonist Vladimir Petrovich has his turn to tell his, he proposes to write it down in a notebook and read it. Herein we are told about Vladimir's sixteen year old self, who is staying with his family in the countryside, wherein he meets his new neighbour Zinaida Alexandrovna Zasyekina. Although the girl is five years his senior, the young Vladimir falls for her immediately. However the beautiful and mischievous Zinaida has other suitors, and many are better placed in life compared with the teenage Vladimir......