First Love by Ivan S. Turgenev
5 episodes - English - Latest episode: over 4 years ago - ★★★★★ - 2 ratingsThe title of the novella is almost an adequate summary in itself. The “boy-meets-girl-then-loses-her” story is universal but not, I think, banal – despite a surprise ending which notoriously turns out to be very little of a surprise. “First Love” is given its originality and poignancy by Turgenev’s mastery of the piercing turning-point (akin to Joyce’s “epiphanies”) that transforms the character’s whole being, making a tragic outcome inevitable. Even the nature symbolism is rescued from triteness by lovely poetic similes – e.g. “but at that point my attention was arrested by the appearance of a speckled woodpecker who busily climbed up the slender stem of a birch-tree and peeped out uneasily from behind it, first to the right, then to the left, like a musician behind the bass-viol.” (Summary by Martin Geeson)
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Episodes
01 – Introductory, Chapters I – V
January 02, 2024 00:00 - 38 minutes - 17.2 MBMore great books at LoyalBooks.com
02 – Chapters VI – IX
January 01, 2024 00:00 - 44 minutes - 20 MBMore great books at LoyalBooks.com
03 – Chapter X – XIV
December 31, 2023 00:00 - 29 minutes - 13.4 MBMore great books at LoyalBooks.com
04 – Chapters XV – XVII
December 30, 2023 00:00 - 33 minutes - 15.3 MBMore great books at LoyalBooks.com
05 – Chapters XVIII – XXII
December 29, 2023 00:00 - 37 minutes - 16.2 MBMore great books at LoyalBooks.com