A Sportsman's Sketches

Ivan Turgenev · 1818–1883 · Russia

Originally Zapiski Okhotnika (Russian)

Why it matters

A gentleman hunter wanders the Russian countryside and, sketch by sketch, renders serfs as fully human where literature had only ever allowed them as property. Alexander II is said to have credited these quiet vignettes with hardening his resolve toward emancipation.

At a glance

Episodic sketches in plain, observational prose, with no continuous plot to track.