A House of Gentlefolk - TURGENEV

1. Summary
Marya, since the death of her husband, has become a social leader in her small provincial
town. Her daughter Liza speaks French quite well and plays the piano. Her other children have the
best tutors available. She takes great delight in receiving guests, especially Panshin, who holds an
important position in Moscow. Her evening gatherings are always entertaining when Panshin is there
to quote his own poetry.
It is rumored that Lavretzky is returning to the district. Although he is a cousin of the house,
Marya scarcely knows how to treat him, for Lavretzky made an unfortunate marriage. He is now
separated from his pretty wife, who is reputed to be fast and flighty. Lavretzky’s visit creates no
difficulties, however. He is a rather silent, affable man, and he notices Liza with interest. Liza is a
religious-minded and beautiful girl of nineteen. It is very evident that the brilliant Panshin is courting
her with the full approval of her mother. On the evening of his visit, Lavretzky is not impressed with
Panshin’s rendition of his musical romance, but the ladies are ecstatic.
The following day Lavretzky goes on to his small country estate. The place is run-down
because it has been uninhabited since his sister’s death. Lavretzky, content to sink into a quiet
country life, orders the gardens cleaned up, moves in some newer furniture, and begins to take an
interest in the crops. He seems suspended in a real Russian atmosphere, close to the land. His new
life is particularly pleasing after his residence in France and the painful separation from his wife.
Lavretzky had an unusual upbringing. His father, disappointed by his failure to inherit an
aunt’s fortune, decided to make his son a strong man, even a Spartan. At twelve years of age,
Lavretzky was dressed in Highland kilts and trained in gymnastics and horsemanship. He was given
only one meal a day, and he took cold showers at four in the morning. Along with the physical
culture intended to produce a natural man according to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s doctrines, the father
indoctrinated his son with Voltaire’s philosophy.
Lavretzky’s father died after enduring great pain for two years. During this time, he lost his
bravery and atheistic independence, and, at the end, he was a sniveling wreck. His death was a
release to Lavretzky, then twenty-three years old, who immediately enrolled in a university in
Moscow. At the opera one night, he met Varvara, the beautiful daughter of a retired general who
lives mostly by his wits. At first, Varvara’s parents have little use for Lavretzky, whom they take to
be an unimportant student. When they learn that he comes of a good family and is a landed
proprietor, they favor an early marriage. Because Varvara wants to travel, Lavretzky winds up his
affairs and installs his new father-in-law as overseer of his properties.
In Paris, Varvara begins a dizzy social whirl. Her adoring husband is content merely to be at
her side, and he lets her indulge her whims freely. She soon gains a reputation as a brilliant host, but
her guests think her husband a nonentity. Lavretzky has no suspicion that Vavara is anything but a
devoted wife and mother to their daughter until a letter accidentally comes into his hands, from
which he learns of her lover and of their furtive meetings. Lavretzky leaves home immediately and
takes up separate residence. When he writes to Varvara, telling her of the reason for the separation,
she does not deny her guilt but asks only for consideration. After settling an income on his wife,
Lavretzky returns to Russia.
At first, Lavretzky stays on his estate; later, he begins to ride into town occasionally to call on
Marya and her family. After he becomes better acquainted with Liza, the young girl scolds him for
being so hardhearted toward his wife. According to Liza’s religious beliefs, Lavretzky should pardon
Varvara for her sins and continue the marriage. Lavretzky warns Liza that the carefree young
diplomat Panshin is all surface and no substance and that he is not the man for her. Lavretzky has an
ally in Marfa, the old aunt, who also sees through Panshin’s fine manners and clever speeches. When
Panshin proposes to Liza by letter, she puts off making a decision.
Liza’s music teacher is an old, broken German named Lemm. Although Lavretzky has little
ear for music, he has a deep appreciation for Lemm’s talent. He invites the old man to his farm.
During the visit, the two men find that they have much in common. Lavretzky is saddened to see that
the old music teacher is hopelessly in love with Liza.
One night, Panshin brilliantly holds forth in Marya’s drawing room on the inadequacies of
Russia. He asserts that the country is far behind the rest of Europe in agriculture and politics. The
English are superior in manufacture and merchandising, the French in social life and the arts, the
Germans in philosophy and science. His views are those of the aristocratic detractors of Russia. The
usually silent Lavretzky finally takes issue with Panshin and skillfully demolishes his every
argument. Liza listens with approval.
Lavretzky comes upon a brief notice in the society section of a French paper, which informs
him that his wife is dead. For a while he cannot think clearly, but as the import of the news comes
home to him he realizes that he is in love with Liza. Riding into town, he gives the paper quietly to
Liza. As soon as he can be alone with her, he declares his love. The young girl receives his
declaration soberly, almost seeming to regard their love as a punishment. Although troubled at first
by her attitude, Lavretzky soon achieves a happiness he never expected to find.
His happiness is short-lived, however. One day, his servant announces that Varvara has
returned with their daughter. She tells him she was very ill and did not bother to correct the rumor of
her death. Now she asks only to be allowed to live somewhere near him. Suspecting that her
meekness is only assumed, Lavretzky arranges for her to live on a distant estate, far from his own
house.
Liza’s reaction is controlled when he tells her the news. She seems almost to have expected
the punishment, for she is convinced that sorrow is the lot of all Russians. Varvara brazenly calls on
Marya and completely captivates her with her beauty, her French manners, and her accomplished
playing and singing. Liza meets Lavretzky’s wife with grave composure. For a time, Varvara
complies with her promise to stay isolated on the distant estate, where she frequently entertains
Panshin. In the winter, when she moves to Moscow, Panshin is her devoted follower. At last, she
goes back to Paris.
Liza enters a convent. Lavretzky sees her once from a distance as she scurries timidly to a
prayer service. Taking what strength he can from the soil, he remains on his farm. When he is forty-
five years old, he visits the house where Liza lived. Marya and everyone else he knew in the
household had died. He feels ill at ease among the younger, laughing generation.

2. Characters Discussed
Marya Dmitrievna Kalitin
Marya Dmitrievna Kalitin (MAH-ryuh DMIHT-ree-ehv-nuh kah-LIH-tihn), a well-to-do
widow, about fifty, fadingly pretty, sentimental, self-indulgent, tearful when crossed but sweet
otherwise. She is easily taken in by Panshin’s blandishments, and she succumbs also to Varvara’s sly
hypocrisy.
 Fedor Ivanitch Lavretsky
Fedor Ivanitch Lavretsky (FYOH-dohr ih-VAH-nihch lahv-REHT-skihy), called Fedya
(FEH-dyuh), her cousin, rosy-cheeked, thick-nosed, curly-haired, well-built. As a boy, he was reared
according to a Rousseauistic system rigorously applied by his father. After his father’s death he
attempted to get a university education to supplement his eccentric, secluded, narrow training.
Following his marriage to Varvara, he gave up his formal schooling but continued to educate himself
through private study. Naïvely trusting his wife to seek her own social entertainment, he was
shocked to learn of her infidelity, and he immediately left her. Although he still broods bitterly on
Varvara at times, he finds himself falling in love with Lisa. Having learned of Varvara’s rumored
death, he longs to marry Lisa despite the age difference between them, but his happiness over Lisa’s
acceptance of his suit is destroyed by Varvara’s reappearance. For Lisa’s sake and at Marya’s
insistence, he agrees to live with Varvara but only on a formal basis. He stays with her only briefly.
He is finally left with memories of the happy time when he thought Lisa could be his, the only happy
moments in his whole life. Lavretsky symbolizes the liberal Russian of Turgenev’s day. He has
attained a Westernized culture; he loves his country; and he wishes to apply democratic ideas in his
relationship with the peasants who till his land according to the agricultural principles he has learned
abroad. In appearance, character, and ideas, he resembles Solomin, the hero of Virgin Soil, who feels
toward the factory workers as Lavretsky does toward the peasants.

Elisaveta Mihailovna Kalitin

Elisaveta Mihailovna Kalitin (eh-lih-zah-VEH-tuh mih-HAH-lov-nuh), called Lisa, Marya’s
slender, dark-haired daughter. Thoughtful and deeply religious, she is troubled because Lavretsky
had left Varvara and has never seen their daughter. Despite Varvara’s adultery, Lisa believes she
should be forgiven and taken back. When it appears that Varvara has died, Lisa at first gently rejects
Lavretsky’s attentions. Later, recognizing his goodness and deep sincerity, and feeling a spiritual
kinship with him despite his indifference to religion, she accepts him. Their happiness is destroyed
by Varvara’s return. Lisa says goodbye not only to Lavretsky but also to her family and the world,
and she becomes a nun. As Lavretsky symbolizes one kind of Russian, Lisa represents another. Her
education is limited; she has the standard learning and attainments of a girl of her class; she is
traditionalist and conservative in her views. Religion, her comfort and stay from childhood on, offers
a retreat in her sorrow.

Varvara Pavlovna
Varvara Pavlovna (vahr-VAH-ruh PAHV-lov-nuh), Lavretsky’s wife, a lovely, intelligent,
charming, and gregarious woman who deceived her husband with a young French lover while giving
Lavretsky the impression of being a devoted wife. Taking advantage of the rumor of her death, she
leaves Paris and comes with her daughter to Vassilyevskoe to seek a reconciliation. Her attempts to
win Lavretsky’s pity fail, but he agrees to let her stay at Lavriky, where he had taken her as a bride.
Because of Lisa and Marya, he lives with her briefly. When he leaves, Panshin becomes Varvara’s
lover. She soon moves to St. Petersburg and later to Paris, where she resumes her former life,
somewhat subdued by age.
 Vladimir Nikolaitch Panshin
Vladimir Nikolaitch Panshin (vlah-DIH-mihr nih-koh-LAH-ihch PAHN-shihn), a
government official, a handsome, self-confident, socially accomplished, multilingual, dissipated,
cold, and false dilettante. Marya thinks him an eligible prospective son-in-law, but Marfa sees
through him, as do Lemm and Lavretsky. After Lisa rejects his offer of marriage, he begins an affair
with Varvara, who is later succeeded by a number of other women. He remains a bachelor.

Marfa Timofyevna Pestov

Marfa Timofyevna Pestov (MAHR-fuh tih-moh-FYEHV-nuh pehs-TOHF), the eccentric,
independent, bluntly truthful, and sharply critical sister of Marya’s father.

Sergei Petrovitch Gedeonovsky

Sergei Petrovitch Gedeonovsky (sehr-GAY peht-ROH-vihch geh-deh-on-OF-skih), a
bachelor, a councilor, and an inveterate gossip and liar.

Christophor Fedoritch Lemm

Christophor Fedoritch Lemm (krihs-toh-FOHR FYOH-do-rihch lehm), an old German music
teacher who detests Russia but is too poor to leave it. He idolizes Lisa and becomes a sympathetic
friend of Lavretsky.

Ivan Petrovitch
Ivan Petrovitch (ih-VAHN), Lavretsky’s father. Irresponsible when young and even after his
marriage, he returns to Russia from France after his father’s death with plans to bring some order and
system into Russian life, starting with his own estate and his son. A combination of Anglomaniac,
French liberal, and domestic despot, he dominates Fedya, even after his health breaks and he goes
blind, until the son is freed by his father’s death when Fedya is twenty-three. Turgenev uses Ivan to
satirize the foolish efforts of some eighteenth and early nineteenth century Russian liberals to
Westernize Russia hurriedly and by force.

Malanya Sergyevna
Malanya Sergyevna (mah-LAH-nyuh sehr-GEHY-ehv-nuh), a former servant, Lavretsky’s
mother. Uneducated, submissive, timid, ailing, she dies when Fedya is a child.

Pavel Petrovitch Korobyin

Pavel Petrovitch Korobyin (PAH-vehl peht-ROH-vihch koh-ROH-bihn), Varvara’s vain,
greedy father, a retired general who left the army after an embezzlement scandal. He becomes the
overseer of Lavretsky’s estate until he is dismissed following Lavretsky’s separation from Varvara.

Mihalevitch
Mihalevitch (mih-hah-LEH-vihch), Lavretsky’s university friend who introduced him to
Varvara. During a brief visit at Vasilyevskoe, he is noisy, brusque, agrumentative, and critical of
what he calls Lavretsky’s loafing, which he considers a primary Russian fault.
 Glafira Petrovna (glah-FIH-ruh peht-ROHV-nuh), Ivan’s harsh-voiced, haughty, dictatorial
sister.

Elena Mihalovna (eh-LEH-nuh mih-HAH-lov-nuh), called Lenotchka (leh-NOHT-chkuh),

Marya’s younger daughter.

Nastasya Karpovna Ogarkov (nahs-TAH-syuh kahr-POHV-nuh oh-GAHR-kof), an elderly,

childless widow, the cheerful, devoted companion of Marfa Timofyevna.

Agafya Vlasyevna (ah-GAH-fyuh VLAH-sehv-nuh), Lisa’s nurse, a peasant who was

formerly the mistress of Lisa’s maternal grandfather. She is responsible for Lisa’s early interest in
religion.

Shurotchka (shew-ROHT-chkuh), a young orphan girl given to Marfa Timofyevna by the

child’s drunken, brutal uncle.

3. Critical Evaluation
The publication of A House of Gentlefolk established Ivan Turgenev as a great novelist.
Although critical opinion generally awarded Ottsy i deti (1862; Fathers and Sons, 1867) the honor of
being Turgenev’s masterpiece, this earlier novel was for more than half a century his most
universally acclaimed work. A House of Gentlefolk is to be appreciated on two separate yet
interlocking and organically unified levels: the social-historical and the artistic. Although in the
novel as a work of art these two aspects are inextricably fused, they may nevertheless be studied
individually to illuminate more clearly some of the work’s underlying themes and to gain deeper
insight into the characters.
Any discussion of Turgenev is enriched by an understanding of social movements in Russia
in the mid-nineteenth century. A cultural controversy had arisen during the author’s lifetime
centering on the question of the relative worth of foreign (that is, Western European) versus
exclusively Russian ideals. The so-called Westerners were a group of Russians who believed that
democracy could cure the ills of society; these individuals repudiated Russia’s autocratic government
as well as her Greek Orthodox religion as outmoded and repressive institutions. They viewed their
homeland as morally, intellectually, and politically primitive in comparison with England, France,
and Germany, which had, either through philosophical soul-searching or practical experimentation,
advanced toward increasingly democratic institutions.
In bitter opposition to the Westerners, there arose a group known as the Slavophiles,
composed of many of Russia’s finest poets and novelists, philosophers and scholars. These men
viewed Western European culture as decadent, corrupt, and morally rotten; they looked to a new and
pure Slavic society, headed by Russia, to rejuvenate Western philosophy. In their enthusiasm over
Slavonic culture, the early Slavophiles often lived among the Russian peasant population to study
their way of life, art and music, social customs, and legal arrangements. Ironically, rather than
leading them to a seemingly obvious condemnation of the tyranny under which the bulk of the
Russian population suffered, their experiences and worship of all things Slavonic led them instead to
condone autocracy and Orthodoxy simply because the masses accepted them unquestioningly.
Although Turgenev is classified as a Westerner in this debate, such classification is
misleading in that it does not account for his clear thinking on the issue. With his brilliant insight and
objectivity, he saw the pitfalls of both camps and avoided their excesses. He was, like the
Westerners, a passionate believer in democracy for the people, but he understood from his heart the
deep and powerful force of the Slavophile argument. Nowhere is Turgenev’s lucidity and freedom of
spirit more evident than in A House of Gentlefolk, where, in the character of Lavretzky, he embodies
all the emotional and psychological richness of Slavophilism with none of its rigidness or excess. In
a lengthy digression about Lavretzky’s lineage, which precedes his appearance in the novel, the
author is careful to stress his hero’s dual background: His mother was a peasant, whereas his father
belonged to the landed aristocracy and had become totally cut off from his people because of his
extended residence in Europe. Lavretzky himself enters the story just returned from a stay in Paris
with his shallow and unfaithful wife; he is coming home to his neglected ancestral estate in order to
reestablish closeness to the land. In the sole political scene in the novel, it is Lavretzky who
eloquently summarizes Slavophile doctrine, insisting that the essential life and spirit of Russia
resides in the common folk; he completely annihilates the feeble platitudes of the unhealthy,
superficial, and egotistical bureaucrat Panshin. It is crucially important, however, that Lavretzky,
unlike his real-life counterparts, is a democratic revolutionary spirit in the truest sense of the word, as
witnessed in his freedom and individuality and in his love for the land and its people.
The woman who grows to love and be loved by Lavretzky is Liza, the heroine of A House of
Gentlefolk. Turgenev endows her character with all the attributes shared by generations of Russian
women, thus giving her a universal quality. Liza’s personality, since it represents the spirit at the
heart of the novel, is of central importance. She is a religious girl, beautiful in moral strength and
purity rather than in physical attractiveness and impressive in her calm passivity, her endurance, and
her single-minded devotion. She is never revealed directly to the reader by the author but rather
develops as a character through her reflection in the people around her; readers learn most about Liza
through the eyes and heart of Lavretzky, but in the last analysis, she remains an elusive, if
entrancing, figure.
Artistically, A House of Gentlefolk is more like an extended short story than a novel. The
plot is slight: In a time span of only two months (not counting the brief epilogue), Lavretzky returns
home and falls in love with Liza; his wife returns after she is believed dead; Liza enters a convent;
and Lavretzky goes to his estate brokenhearted. The central theme is embodied in the love story,
around which all the elements in the novel revolve; setting, atmosphere, and minor characterizations
all combine to produce the single effect of the love sequence. This powerful singleness of effect
gives the novel an extraordinary cohesiveness and perfection of structure.
This cohesiveness is perhaps best seen in Turgenev’s evocation of a summer atmosphere,
which coincides throughout the story with the emotions of the hero and heroine. The spirit of
summer pervades the scene of Liza meeting Lavretzky in the garden, for example, imbuing the
passage with an unsurpassed lyrical beauty. Likewise, the minor personages in the story, while being
among Turgenev’s most brilliant sketches of character, owe their primary importance to their
relationship to the hero or heroine. The odious Panshin; the passionate old German, Lemm; Liza’s
mother and her crusty, wise old aunt, Marfa Timofyevna; Lavretzky’s malicious wife, Varvara:
These unforgettable figures serve to reveal something about the two central characters. Along with
the summer atmosphere and country landscape, of which they almost seem a part, they set the stage
for the love story long before its participants make their entrance. The reader is given detailed
portraits of a collection of minor characters before receiving any more description of Liza than that
she is “a slender, tall, dark-haired girl of nineteen”; Lavretzky’s belated appearance is preceded by a
nine-chapter digression on his genealogy.
In his usual fashion, Turgenev uses his characters’ love affairs to test their strength and
worth. When in the epilogue Lavretzky returns after eight years to visit the house where Liza used to
live, readers find that, despite his shattering loss of happiness, he has not only survived but emerged
from the ordeal a better and kinder man. On one level, Turgenev has produced in his hero a symbol
of the indomitable strength of the Russian soul; on another, he has shown the capacity inherent in all
people for transcendence of pain and growth through suffering. A House of Gentlefolk is an
elevating tale of melancholy but not defeat and of sadness mingled with hope.