A Strange Story: Turgenev brings us a woman with countless options at her feet choosing to turn her back on society and go down a radically different path.

Written by Ivan Turgenev

Narrated by Mark Rice-Oxley and Ghizela Rowe

Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev was born on 9th November 1818 in Oryol, Russia to parents from the nobility. He and his two brothers were raised by their mother on the family estate. Surrounded by foreign governesses he became fluent in French, German, and English. Their father spent little time with them and this undoubtedly had an effect on him and his brothers. When he was nine the family moved to Moscow to give their children a better education.

Turgenev studied for a year at the University of Moscow and then at the University of St Petersburg to study Classics, Russian literature, and philology. During that time his father died from kidney stone disease. In 1838 Turgenev studied philosophy and history at the University of Berlin for 3 years before returning to St Petersburg for his master's.

He started his career with the Russian Civil Service and it was only in 1852, after several earlier publications, that he made his name with his short story collection, ‘A Sportsman's Sketches’, based on his observations of peasant life and nature.

That same year he wrote an obituary for Nikolai Gogol: "Gogol is dead!... What Russian heart is not shaken by those three words?... He is gone, that man whom we now have the right (the bitter right, given to us by death) to call great." The St Petersburg censor banned publication but the Moscow censor allowed it. He was dismissed but Turgenev was held responsible and imprisoned for a month, and then exiled to his country estate.

Along with many other intellectuals Turgenev left Russia and settled in Paris in 1854. During this period he wrote his finest stories and four novels.

Alexander II ascended the Russian throne in 1855, and the political climate relaxed. Turgenev returned home.

‘Fathers and Sons’, Turgenev's most famous and enduring novel, appeared in 1862. Its leading character is considered the first ‘Bolshevik’ in Russian literature. But the hostile reaction prompted Turgenev's decision to again leave Russia.

His health declined during his later years. In January 1883, an aggressive malignant tumor was removed but by then it had metastasized in his upper spinal cord, causing him intense pain in his final few months of life.

Ivan Turgenev died on 3rd September 1883 of a spinal abscess, a complication of the metastatic liposarcoma, in his house near Paris. He was buried in St Petersburg.

In this tale a young girl, Sophia, endures difficult circumstances before several years later becoming the companion of a devout, but pitifully poor, vagrant holy man wandering the countryside.

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Copyright Group
• Release date: Jan 1, 2022
• ISBN: 9781803541358

Ivan Turgenev

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.