Public reader discussion about A Hero of Our Time in the WeRead Catalog by Mikhail Iurevich Lermontov.
By HorseDawn31
I’ve got a few, I guess: - Raskolnikov (Crime and Punishment) - the guy from Notes from the Underground - Meursault (The Stranger) - Gordon Comstock (Keep the Aspidistra Flying) - Bartholomew Crane from that smaller book, Lost Girls Also, why am I getting downvoted? I’m not even sure how karma works for text posts.
By NovelRusty95
Someone in here said *The Night Circus* doesn’t get any love, and I just don’t buy that. I really love it, and I know lots of other people who do too—pretty sure it was a big bestseller. Makes me think people’s ideas of “success” with books are kind of messed up. I’d love to swap books that you’ve read that basically nobody you know has picked up—those little hidden gems. Maybe we can hype them up and get more people reading. A few I’d throw out: - *Blueprints of the Afterlife* by Ryan Boudinot. It’s got that Charlie Kaufman, *Synecdoche, New York* vibe but in sci-fi form, and I thought it was awesome. - *Agaat* by Marlene van Niekerk. Such a beautiful South African novel about a Black woman raised by a white farmer during Apartheid. - *A Maggot* by John Fowles. He’s not as famous as he used to be, but I feel like *The French Lieutenant’s Woman* kind of eats up most of his reputation, even though this weird little mystery thing set among the Shakers in colonial America is really something. If people actually reply, I’ll add more. Really curious to see what everyone else is reading. Edit: wow, this thread is great. Thanks to everyone who’s chimed in—I’m having a blast scrolling and adding titles. I’m finding a bunch of new stuff (and some old favorites too). Seriously, these books deserve more readers, so please keep ‘em coming! And also thanks for the awards/badges thingies!!!
By electricpepper
Russian books, both the imperial ones and the Soviet ones (which sometimes couldn’t even be published fully because of censorship), have always struck me as really radical and tough on society—especially when you compare them to what the Russian state was like back then. But then I can’t help wondering: if literature really does have an impact on society, why didn’t it actually change Russia more? And why are we left with the same kind of situation?
By Tide-Thunder1999
Honestly, it’s really beautiful. Out of everything I had to read for school, this one was probably the best. It still feels super relevant too—especially that whole loss of interest in life thing. It feels like one of the biggest problems in my generation, and the one before. I also liked the writing style; it’s kind of “hooky” and easy to get pulled into. And the narrator’s viewpoint is weird in a good way, like the protagonist is looked at by different people, so you end up seeing more than just one side of him. The part that stuck with me the most was the ending, when he talks about fate. I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who hasn’t finished yet. I also liked the chapter with the blind boy—the mood in that one feels darker and more adventurous. It’s kind of crazy that Lermontov wrote it when he was so young. He still managed to write a lot of interesting stuff even if he’s not super well known. The only downside is that not many people seem to read it, so it’s hard to actually talk about it with someone. There’s so much to discuss. So yeah—what did you think? Did you like it?
By Notices_Careful2
There was this crazy sight out on the distant horizon—like the star “choirs” were dancing in these wild patterns—and then, one by one, they just faded away as the pale light of morning started taking over. The sky even turned that lilac color, and little by little the steep mountain sides came into view, still fresh with snow. On both sides there were these dark, ominous gaps, and thick mist was sliding and curling along the cliff edges like it was alive or scared of the coming day.
By Mug-Couplet
I’ve read it and I don’t really know anyone else who has, so when I went looking at reviews lately it was all over the place. Some people were saying it’s not very original or that it doesn’t work for them, and now I’m kind of wondering if my memory of it is just better than the actual book. It’s still one of my favorites though, so I’d really like to hear what other people thought—like your actual opinions, not just “the story falls apart” or “it’s confusing.”
By letter_dull915
Really happy someone else is picking this up too—this is awesome!
By prologue_chaffer1978
Pechorin from *A Hero of Our Time* by Lermontov has basically always been one of my favorite protagonists. What other books have leads that feel similar? P.S. If anyone brings up Edward Cullen, I’m gonna flip out.
By verseWatches28
I kind of wish it was from Russian lit instead, maybe optional though.
By BronzeRaven9101
I’m kind of craving another book with a character as gripping as Pechorin, but I’ve already read *A Hero of Our Time* way too many times to jump back into it again. Any recommendations for novels where the main character pulls at your emotions/thoughts like he does? And yeah, you can totally talk about Pechorin too—I don’t think I’d ever get bored analyzing him. My take is that he’s somehow both really gross and also kind of sad in an endearing way. I’m torn between loving him and hating him, but I mostly just relate to that cold, hopeless apathy he has—too much of it shows up in me and other people, so I can’t really blame him for it.
By looksbridge
I was on a plane once, chatting with a woman who grew up in Paris, and I asked what she had to read in high school. She actually gave me a list: - *Bel-Ami* by Guy de Maupassant - *Germinal* and *L’Assommoir* by Émile Zola - *Les Misérables* by Victor Hugo I’m in Ontario, Canada. Over the last ten years or so, our curriculum seems like it went wide open, so teachers can basically pick whatever. I remember *The Kite Runner* by Khaled Hosseini getting popular for a bit, and *Three Day Road* by Joseph Boyden too. But if we’re talking back to my high school days in the late 90s, I’d guess most of my class ended up reading stuff like: - *Lord of the Flies* - *1984* - *Macbeth* - “Harrison Bergeron” (Kurt Vonnegut Jr.) Curious though—where is everyone else from, and what were the most common things you had to read in high school?
By dustyhare
Pretty much everyone with a brain knows corporations are usually full of it.
By SwiftCell2965
This Sunday the 29th we’re supposed to talk about Houellebecq’s *Submission*. In the meantime, I’m wondering if anyone’s reading a Russian book right now—drop what you’re on, please. Also, we’re back with the Cossacks again for a third year, and this time it’s “in the present,” which is kinda funny/odd. The Lermontov bit is pretty intense: he was an officer in a Hussar regiment and wrote *A Hero of Our Time* back in 1839, not long after Pushkin died, and then not too long before Lermontov himself got killed in a duel. I’m not 100% sure how the whole duel situation “worked out” exactly, but the basic story is that Martynov challenged him and ended up shooting first, and Lermontov supposedly told people he’d shoot into the air. Then of course he got hit. Anyway, *A Hero of Our Time* is basically a five-part thing about Pechorin—fearless, kind of womanizing, and always moving like he’s bored of everything. The stories feel a bit like American Western vibes, but with way more melodrama and an ironic narrator looking sideways at everything. I did like some of the set-ups, especially *Bela* and *Princess Mary*. *Taman* is probably my favorite because it’s got that seaside atmosphere and it almost feels lighter than the rest, even though stuff is still going wrong. Pechorin just keeps doing whatever, and everyone around him is left wondering what he even thinks of them. He’s got that whole Byronic/creepy-cool vibe too, which is… a lot. I’ve read enough Lermontov to sort of get the tone, but I’d still love to know what other people think of him—like, do you like him, find him annoying, or somewhere in between?