Spring Torrents, by Ivan Turgenev

On his way back to Russian from Italy, twenty-three years old noble man Dimitry Sanin stopped in Frankfurt planning a half-day stay. In a small Italian cafe, he encountered a very beautiful girl, the cafe owner's daughter, whose brother just passed out. By saving the boy, Sanin got acquainted with the girl's family. Immediately, Sanin "for the first time fell deeply, deliriously in love", and he realized this love after a ironical duel with a military officer who had insulted Gemma. This duel won the heart of Gemma. However, Gemma's mother, a practical widow, asked that Sanin had to live in Frankfurt with her family and offer financial support for her depressing business. "Convinced that nothing can come in the way of everlasting happiness between them, Sanin impetuously decided to sell his Russian estates and started a new life". Maria Nikolaevna, the rich wife of his old classmate, was the one to whom he tried to sell his estates. Maria was a strong-mind women who exploited every opportunity to satisfy her desire on sexual pleasure and conquering men. Not being able to resist her allures, although well recognizing it from the beginning, Sanin fell as one of her slaves in three days. In the carriage leaving for Paris, Sanin, entirely destroyed, was peeling a pear for Maria's husband, with Maria mocking him with smile.

This is a book about love versus sexual desire, and will versus choice. Turgenev, who suffered his entire life from sexual desire, questions the existence of real love. It is true that sexual desire is most often mistaken as love; however, I believe that real love exists. Sexual desire origins from oneself, and it is a desire for fulfilling an image in one's own subconsciousness. An object in existence arouses this desire because it bears some similarity to that image. The object is used barely as a tool or channel to exercise the desire, but it will never satisfy the desire. Love is different in that the object involved is the one being loved; it is loved as it is. Sexual desire could be converted to love, when the image in one subconsciousness is gradually replaced by the loved one (which stays in consciousness), a process achieved after long-time communications, mutual understandings, and mutual affections.

Turgeneve is a follower of Arthur Schopenhauer, the author of The World as Will and Presentation, who believes that one has no real choice, and everything was just the will of the fundamental forces lying underline human beings and the nature. Well, I agree that most (almost all) people have no choice -- what is presented just looks like a choice, but the choice is determined. However, I expect that the real choice is obtainable, although very hard. Human beings are part of the nature and built with the fundamental forces; however, we have one powerful tool, the ability to think, that could earn us freedom. Through thinking, by understanding how the nature and those forces impact on us, one could be able to improve/reconstruct/rebuild his inner world, and eventually become God of his world.

I never consider Turgenev a genius: to me he lacks something that makes him stand out as a giant. However, I go to his works again and gain. He has something that I favor, just like those which are unique in home dishes and could never be replaced by sophisticated cuisine. After reading the translator's essay, I know what it is. It is his mild character that attracts me all the time. I am a sort of strong-mind person, and, on the contrary to Turgenev who admires those who will their lives (such as Maria Nikolaevna in this story), I always wish I could become more tolerant and be nicer to ones I love.

I recommend reading this story together with Turgenev's First Love, which is more romantic and has more beautiful writings on the feeling of first love (or indeed sexual desire). Spring Torrents, on the other hand, is richer and through it you can understand Turgenev better.

The book I read is one of Penguin Classics, translated by Leonard Schapiro. ISBN 014044369X. I never like Penguin Classics series because of its poor paper quality and very often small font. The book I read, 20-year old, is already so damaged by moisture that it becomes a home of germs. My body itches all over when the book is opened. However, this particular edition contains an excellent essay written by the translator. This 66-page essay (Turgenev's story is only 175-page long) provides a great deal of information useful in understanding Turgenev and the themes of the book.